The Order of the Ladbroke Grove Anarchists
by dorkickassmeadowes
Summary: AU in which Lily is a bored suburban teenager, James is an angry punk, and Mrs Figg runs a corner shop.
1. William, It Was Really Nothing

William, It Was Really Nothing

_the rain falls hard on a humdrum town_

_this town's gonna drag you down…_

* * *

The summer after her sixteenth birthday, Lily Evans realised that her home town was a shithole. The realization struck her one morning in mid June, during the longest, hottest summer that she had ever experienced, as she lay on the browning grass of her front lawn, and listened to her sister, the boring and horse faced Petunia, talk on the phone to her boyfriend in the kitchen. It occurred to Lily in the haze of that summer afternoon that nothing had ever happened to her. That nothing ever happened _here_, in this town. It was a nice place (emphasis on the word_ nice_) and her childhood had been pleasant, but uneventful, and everyone on her street was polite and put the bins out when they were supposed to, and she'd just finished her O Levels, and was going to college in the autumn to do secretarial skills, just like her sister and mother had done before her and it was lovely and safe and any child would be lucky to grow up there but my God, it was _boring_. It was mind numbingly dull, laid out on the back lawn, listening to Petunia harp on about _drills _and _engagement rings_ and Lily Evans realised then that if she didn't get out of Cokeworth _right now, _then she never would.

The place to be, she knew, was London. It was always the place to be. It had always been the place to be. She'd heard all those stories, about the Swinging Sixties, when you could dance all night in the clubs alongside the coolest, brightest stars of the day. But that was the sixties, she realised; today was very different.

It was mid August when she realised just how badly she wanted to be in London, when she saw a glimpse of what was there.

Her old school friend, the worryingly quiet and oft picked upon Mary MacDonald, and herself, attended a concert at the local college; a 'punk band', who played Monkees covers viciously and violently, swore at the audience, and smashed their guitars. The set was just twenty minutes long, but it sparked a fire in Lily Evans, one that burned and sizzled. _This_, she thought to herself, arms in the air and sweat dripping down her pale face, _this is what I was looking for._

At the end of the set, the girls went to get Cokes from the makeshift bar the Student Union had set up by the back door of the hall.

"What did you think?" Lily asked Mary as they sipped their drinks, "Mad, wasn't it?"

"It was…" Mary thought for a moment, "It was…I mean…there was no _subtlety,_ was there? It was like... they weren't… they weren't Queen, were they?"

"No," Lily remarked thoughtfully, "no, they weren't. They were different though."

"Hmm…" Mary murmured, "Different isn't necessarily a _good _thing though."

Lily merely shrugged; there was no trying to explain it to Mary, because Mary didn't understand it. She was not bored here, in Cokeworth, and she was perfectly happy to spend the rest of her life in a semi detached suburban hell-hole, married to the first bloke who looked at her, with two kids inevitably called _Tracey _and _Adrian_.

"I wonder if they've got any demo tapes…" Lily said absentmindedly.

Mary rolled her eyes, and went back to drinking her Coke, and Lily began to look around for one of the band members. They had to be here _somewhere_. Where had they gone after they left the stage?

They were easily recognizable; the lead singer had spiky bleached blonde hair and wore a ripped bodice (Lily had never seen anything like it), the bassist was in a Mod suit, all skinny trousers and a Beatles mop top. The drummer had shaved all his hair off, and had an ear pierced. And the rhythm guitarist wore a denim jacket with the word HATE sewn on the back. Gosh, they were a bunch of misfits, weren't they? But where had they _gone_?

It was then that she noticed a girl on the side of the stage. This girl- who would change Lily Evans' life, but we'll get to that in a minute- had very long, straggly blonde hair, a heart shaped freckly face, icy blue eyes and the most bored expression Lily had ever seen in her sixteen years on the planet. She was wearing battered Doc Martens and a jumper that barely covered her thighs, and Lily thought she was the _coolest person in the entire world_. She just seemed so effortless, like she hadn't even thought about her hair or her clothes or the way she arranged her features so that she looked like she both hated and loved everyone in the room. You know the feeling, don't you dear reader? When you see someone with great hair, or great clothes and you fall completely and utterly in platonic love? That was how Lily felt. "Mary," she nudged her friend, "Mary, I think that girl over there's with the band…" she gestured to the Coolest Girl in the Entire World, "I'll go and ask about demo tapes…"

Mary looked over at the Coolest Girl in the Entire World, and immediately wrinkled her nose in disgust. "God, what is she wearing? She looks like some kind of two pound prostitute."

"I think she looks brilliant," Lily said sharply, "I'll see you in a minute."

And before Mary could reply, she walked off.

"S'cuse me?" Lily said to the Coolest Girl in the Entire World, "Um…are you with the band?"

The girl laughed, and Lily realised that she was Scottish. "Yeah," she smiled down at Lily, because she was standing on the edge of the stage, "yeah, I am. What d'you want?"

"Iwaswonderingifyouhadanydemotapes." Lily said quickly, not taking a breath between words.

"Woah, there, Ginge," the girl hopped off the ledge, and Lily noticed that she was remarkably tall, "say that again, but slowly."

"I was wondering," she replied, "if you had any demo tapes? Please?"

The girl laughed again. "God no, Ginge! Do they look like the kind of band who could possibly record anything? Fuck, they can't even play their instruments properly! I'll tell them you asked though, maybe that'll get them to pull their fingers out, actually start acting like a proper band." She glanced down at Lily, who was at least three inches shorter than she, "What's your name, Ginge?"

"Lily Evans," replied Lily Evans, "Are you…are you one of their girlfriends?"

The blonde girl let out a yelp of laughter, and clapped Lily on the shoulder. She seemed surprised by such a question.

"FUCK NO!" she shouted, "FUCK NO! I'm, urm, my brother's the lead singer. I'm their-" and she made speech marks in the air as she spoke- "'tour manager'. Which is bollocks because this isn't even a tour, but there you go. I'm Marlene." And she shoved Lily playfully, "We're going down the pub, d'you fancy it?"

Lily, still slightly in awe of this girl and her coolness, glanced around for Mary, thinking that perhaps she best not, it's illegal and she promised her mum she'd be home by five… but Mary was nowhere to be seen. And this girl- Marlene- was a _tour manager_. She was responsible. A grown up, even!

In order to check this theory, that Marlene was a responsible grown up, Lily asked; "how old are you?"

"Sixteen," came the reply, "it was my sixteenth last Thursday. You?"

"Same. In January." And it was at this moment that Lily realised that punk was neither grown up nor responsible. But even so- she felt like she just _had to go. _It was something _interesting,_ something _fun, _happening to her in this shithole town and she would be mad to miss it.

"You coming?" Marlene asked her, picking up a sweat drenched leather jacket with the word SICK written on the back in chalk, from where it was draped over a speaker on the side of the stage.

"Yeah," Lily said with as much casualness as she could muster, "yeah, alright."

"Excellent!" Marlene grinned, "I warn you, they're children."

The summer after her sixteenth birthday, Lily Evans realised that her home town was a shithole and that angry seventeen year old boys and a blonde girl called Marlene were probably going to save her life.


	2. Shot By Both Sides

_Shot by both sides  
on the run to the outside of everything  
shot by both sides  
they must have come to a secret understanding_

* * *

Marlene's brother was called Matt, and he called everyone 'pig'. He was eighteen, had dropped out of school at the age of twelve after a teacher punched him in the face ('to be fair, I was a stupid fucker' he told Lily wisely) and he thought the suburbs were shit.

"I mean," he gestured around him, "look at this! What is it? It's _boring_, that's what it is! The entire fucking country is _boring_! There's nothing! No future, no life. Nothing! You go to school and they suck out your soul, you get a job and they repress you, you watch the telly and they teach you not to think, you pay your taxes to a government that doesn't give a shit. No wonder one in five cracks up!" And in order for his speech to make as much impact as possible, he ended it by downing his pint.

"You nicked that off a wall in Camden," Marlene said coolly, sipping her beer, "For someone who preaches originality, you don't know fuck."

"No one knows fuck," piped up the bassist, who Lily learnt was called Bonehead (his real name being Edgar Bones) "human beings are shit, aren't they?"

"Everything's shit," Marlene said philosophically, "that's why we have to make it _less _shit."

"Fuck that," Matt said sharply, "I'm not doing this-" and he gestured around him again, "to save the world or whatever bullshit you're thinking of, pig. I'm doing it because I fucking can."

The rest of the band nodded, and Marlene rolled her eyes. "Nihilists."

"Capitalist ball sucker."

"Anarchist tit licker."

"Government whore."

"I don't have anything to do with the government thank you very fucking much."

"Yes you do, pig," and Matt flicked the froth that sat on the top of Lily's beer at Marlene, "you're a _tour manager_, that's as corporate as they come. You're practically Maggie fucking Thatcher."

"At least I shower," Marlene snapped back, "you smell like a twelve year old boy."

"Get us places with running water then, you little shit," the drummer finished his pint (Marlene had told her that this was Gideon, and that the rhythm guitarist was his younger brother, Fabian) "Don't complain that we smell when you don't provide for us."

"Commie bastard," Marlene responded playfully, "Use your initiative; wash in a river."

It was quite unlike anything Lily had ever experienced before. This was no dinner time 'how terrible that we're back on the three day week' conversation that was cut short because her father and Petunia got into an argument about the unions. This was…this was _real_.

"What's wrong with being a Communist?" she asked aloud (and immediately regretted that decision, because all fiery eyes were on her) "I mean…all animals are equal…?"

"Communists are boring now, pig," Matt told her, "There's no fight in them. I don't want equality; I want blood."

"Matt's just pissed because he's not a Bolshevik in nineteen seventeen Russia; that's where all the _real _anarchy was, right Matt?" Marlene laughed and sipped her beer. "Right, fuckwits," and she stood, "time to get going. Ladbroke Grove won't wait forever. And I've left the Marauders in charge of the flat, and fuck knows what state it'll be in when we get back."

She clapped Lily on the shoulder again, and said with a smile; "it's been lovely meeting you, Ginge. Nice to find someone else who actually gives a shit. Give us a bell if you're ever knocking about West London, yeah?"

Lily nodded, though she could not understand why Marlene, why any of them, would want to spend any time with a boring suburban teenager (of course, Lily was yet to realise that they were _all _boring suburban teenagers).

"Good luck with everything," she smiled up at Marlene, "and if you ever make a demo tape..."

The boys stood, stretching and yawning and downing the last of their pints, and Lily wondered what she was going to do now. What was there to do, when in three weeks she was going to learn how to be a _secretary_? How could anyone learn how to be a secretary when there were people like _this _in the world, interesting and intelligent and _different_ people in the world? But they were leaving, they were going off to their debauchery and their anarchy, and she was left behind, and she just knew that she was going to end up with a son called _Adrian_.

"Bye Marlene!"she called as the band and their 'tour manager' wandered out of the pub, swearing and punching each other on the arm, and being _alive_. Marlene waved goodbye nonchalantly, and as they left Lily heard the blonde girl shout "FUCK OFF MATTHEW!"


	3. Don't Stop Believing

_Just a small town girl_

_Living in a lonely world_

_Took the midnight train going anywhere_

* * *

Petunia woke her on the morning of the first of September with a mug of cold tea and a brisk "morning, Lily."

If you'd asked Lily at the age of eleven to describe Petunia she would've said "Petunia Evans is thirteen and has brown hair and is my absolute best friend."

At thirteen she would've said "Petunia has terrible taste in music but sometimes she can be quite funny."

At fifteen, it would've been a straight "Petunia is a bitch."

But now? Petunia was...Petunia was complicated. She was at secretarial college, and she had a boyfriend and she occasionally went dancing at the disco techs with her old school friends and she drank sweet sherries and listened to ABBA, and at first glance one might think she was lovely, that Lily was lucky to have such a sister, but if you listened to her, the way she spoke to her sister like she was a child, the patronising smile on her face whenever Lily asked her something, you might change your mind.

It was complicated, she was complicated and sometimes Lily just wished she had a sister like Meg in _Little Women_, or Jane Bennett in _Pride and Prejudice_, one that was always there and always kind and always stuck up for her and loved her totally _unconditionally_.

Because there were always conditions to Petunia's affection; Lily had to get the broken biscuits, or the ugliest jumper. Lily was the one who didn't get to choose the television channel, or what they were having for tea, and if Lily _did _do any of those things, then Petunia wouldn't talk to her, or she'd make cutting comments about Lily's hair, or her taste in music or her clothes, and Lily would lock herself in her room and cry.

It was hard being Petunia Evans' little sister and Lily would sometimes catch herself wishing she was an only child.

"Big day today," Petunia said shortly, as Lily heaved herself into a sitting position to take the tea.

"I'm not too worried," Lily brushed off her nerves. No one else from school was going to study Secretarial Skills. _To be honest, Lily didn't even want to _be _a secretary._ "Should be fun."

"Hmm, no, it won't be." Petunia leant against Lily's wardrobe with an air of forced nonchalance, "They treat first formers abominably you know. And the food's awful. And you don't know anyone. Gosh," she twirled a lock of blonde hair around her bony finger and smiled sickeningly, "I don't know what I would do if I were you. Oh well," she shrugged, and made for the door, "have fun!"

_Bitch_.

As she dressed, Petunia's words ran around Lily's head. Awful food first formers you don't know anyone awful food first formers you don't know anyone- _you don't even want to be a secretary, Evans!_

It was true, she didn't, she didn't want to be a secretary and she didn't want to be stuck in this tiny town where she couldn't bloody _breathe_ and without realising it, she was pulling a battered brown leather suitcase out from under her bed, and throwing her clothes into it, all higgledy-piggledy, her jumpers and her jeans and her socks all shoved in there. She couldn't stand it, the silence that filled the air all around her, the silence that choked her and _she really, really didn't want to be a secretary_.

There was an entire world out there ripe for the picking, and she could take it, if she really wanted to, there was nothing stopping her getting the 42 to East Hounslow and then a tube to Ladbroke Grove, she could do it, she could do it.

So she did it.

She wasn't even aware of it, lugging the suitcase off the bus, using her brand spanking new student card to get the cheapest bus to the Tube station, she couldn't concentrate on anything except _getting out_. She hadn't had breakfast and she had no money but she wasn't in Cokeworth anymore and she could _breathe._

It wasn't until she got to the Ladbroke Grove Station that she realised the enormity of what she'd done. She'd run away. She was a runaway. Her mother would report her missing. There'd be posters in the shop windows with her face on; her parents would rack up a huge bill at the stationers from photocopying. Lily Evans, despite being bored, was kind in her heart, and she couldn't bear the thought of her mother finding her suitcase missing and her wardrobe empty. _Go back_, a little voice in her head said, _go back, no one will know. Do this properly, Lily, don't break their hearts. _

She exhaled, like she'd not breathed since she left her house, and half collapsed on the lamppost by the Co Op. She was exhausted. Running away was exhausting. God, she was stupid. She didn't even know where Marlene and the rest of the band lived. She had no phone number, no _surname_ to look them up in the phone book with. She was an idiot, and she should go home. _Go home¸ _the voice said again, _go home and become a secretary. _

But she didn't want to. She didn't want to be a secretary and she didn't want to live in a semi detached and she didn't want a son called Adrian and a daughter named Tracey, she didn't want to go to college, she didn't want to be a secretary, she didn't want to be a secretary, _she did not want to be a secretary_.

She had to admit though, that running away without a word was stupid. Her mother had given birth to her; she had a right to know where she was. _And _there was the small issue of her being a minor. With a sigh, Lily dragged her suitcase down the street. She had to find a telephone box; she was going to phone her mother.

Ring. Ring. Ring. R-i-i-i-i-n-n-n-g-g-g-g.

"Hello? Sheila Evans speaking."

"Mum, it's me." She'd never really been aware of how posh she sounded, until now, when her clipped tones rang through her ears and hurt her head.

"'Tuney?"

"No, Mum, it's Lily..."

"Aren't you at college, darling?" Her mother sounded worried. _Oh shit, oh shit, oh you idiot Evans, you idiot, you idiot._

"No, Mum, I'm not at college…"

"Where are you then? Are you hurt? Do I need to come and get you?"

"I'm in London, Mum." _Oh, bugger._

"What d'you mean you're in London?" Her mother's voice was getting higher, shrieking slightly. "Have you been abducted?"

"Mum, I…" _how to say it…?_ "Mum, I don't want to be a secretary."

"You're being ridiculous." Her mother snapped, sounding more and more like Petunia with every passing second, "You want to go to college; you worked hard to go to college. Come home, and let's stop this silly-"

"No," hot tears pricked Lily's eyelids, but she willed herself not to cry. Now was not the time to cry. "No, Mum, I don't want to go to college and I don't want to be a secretary. I'm…I'm going to stay with a friend for a bit, sort my head out…" A lie, but it was less painful than the truth.

"_Where has all this come from?_" her mother shrieked down the phone, "Lily Charlotte Evans, you tell me this instance who has been putting these _ridiculous _ideas into your head! Of _course _you want to go to college! You want to be a secretary, like me and Tuney! Its tradition! And you've not got any friends in London, Lily- _we don't know anyone in London, why are you there_?"

"I don't want to be a secretary," Lily repeated slowly, choking back the tears. Why did her mother not _understand_? "I don't want to be a secretary, and if I stay in Cokeworth…if I stay, it'll kill me, Mum…"

"Don't be stupid," her mother snapped, "you're a child, Lily. Tell me where you are and I'll come and pick you up. You don't know anything."

But she did. That was the problem. She did know things, she knew more than her mother did and she knew more than Mary and more than Petunia. She knew that the universe did not centre on dinner parties and gossip; she knew that there was a _world _out there, and she had to find it. She had to.

"I'll ring you, Mum. I love you."

"Stop being silly, you haven't got any money, tell me where you are, Lily, tell me where you are, _tell me where you-"_

She put the phone down, and her knees seemed to give way. Clutching the receiver to keep herself up, she choked out three long, shuddering sobs.

She had spent her last twenty five pence- her emergency Mars Bar money- on the phone call, and now she was skint and alone in a city that she'd only ever been on day trips to. Her mother was right; she knew no one there, not really. She'd met Marlene once, at a concert, and now she was expecting her to greet this stranger with open arms? Ridiculous. Nerves and regret began to bubble inside Lily's stomach like acid. _You're an idiot, you're an idiot, you're an idiot, you're an idiot, you're a_-

"Ginge?"

_Thank God_.

She turned around slowly, hand still on the receiver, phone box door partially open. Marlene stood before her, long hair scraped up into a pony tail, and a huge grin on her face.

"Ginge!" Marlene said again, "Ginge, you're here!"

Lily nodded. Her throat seemed impossibly dry, and she couldn't talk. _How? What was this? What had she done to deserve this miracle? _

Marlene was still beaming. "What are you doing in London?"

She couldn't reply; her tongue seemed to be stuck to the top of her mouth, so instead she smiled weakly. Marlene did not seem bothered, and instead pulled her from the phone box by the arm, grinning from ear to ear. "Y'know, I was saying to Matt the other day that we should go back to Cokeworth – you seemed lost."

Somehow, Lily found her voice again. "I was," she croaked, "I was a bit lost, yeah…"

Marlene stopped and turned to her. "Have you done a bunk..?"

She nodded, and the blonde girl's smile widened.

"So you'll need somewhere to doss?"

She nodded again, throat still dry and head pounding.

"_Brilliant! _Lily Evans- that's your surname, right, Evans? Edwards? Doesn't matter, you can change it- Lily Suburbs, teenage runaway." Marlene flung an arm around Lily's shoulder, "You'll fit right in, Ginge."


	4. Old Yellow Bricks

_Who wants to sleep in a city that never wakes up_

_Blinded by nostalgia?_

* * *

Marlene half led, half dragged Lily through the streets of Ladbroke Grove. They were full of empty shops and suited businessmen on their way to work, and leather jacket wearing youths who made obscene gestures at Marlene (she responded with an obscene gesture of her own, one that used her middle finger on her right hand) and teenage girls so _obviously _bunking off school with their coats pulled tightly over their blouses, but the tops of their green and silver ties poking out of their collars, betraying them. She dragged Lily down alley after alley, tripping over cats and possibly dead homeless men and syringes and empty beer bottles, until, eventually, they came to a row of houses so derelict and abandoned that it was almost sad.

It was terraced, smack bang in the middle of the forgotten street, with a little set of steps leading up to a door with peeling brown paint, and the number 12 scratched into the wood. There was another set of steps going down into what Lily assumed must be some kind of basement. The house looked old; like one gust of wind would blow it down. The windows on the ground floor were broken, and cardboard had been put in the gap left by the glass. Someone had drawn a penis on the cardboard (and the anarchy A too). Marlene seemed nonplussed by this, and gestured to the steps leading to the door.

"It's not much," she said, hopping up them two at a time (although this was not an incredible feat; there were just four of them) "but its home."

The sound of out of tune guitars could be heard out of the upstairs windows. Out of the corner of her green eyes, Lily saw a rat scuttle past. It was _nothing_ like Cokeworth.  
"It's…it's brilliant…"

Marlene led the way. The door creaked when opened, and the hallway was dark ("light bulbs bust") and musty and there were coats- trench coats, denim jackets, leather jackets, fur coats, anoraks- all over the floor. The hallway was long and thin and at the end, there was a strip of light coming from a doorway at the end, and from that strip of light they heard a voice- a woman's voice, an East End roar- yell "I'LL STOP BEING A BITCH WHEN YOU STOP BEING A MISOGYNIST!"

Lily raised an eyebrow at Marlene.

"Dorcas," the blonde responded, "you'll love her."

They continued down the hallway, and Lily tried not to trip on the shoes that lay hidden under the coats. Marlene pushed the door open, with a cheery "Morning fuckwits! I brought a present!"

Lily hovered outside the door's light; she could see inside the room. It was small, but light, and was filled with moth eaten sofas and armchairs and there was a graying mattress underneath a huge window, and on every available space there sat some of the most interesting looking people she'd ever seen. Suddenly, she felt very out of place, with her smart pullover and brown skirt and _oh God, her Clarks sandals that she was wearing with socks what was wrong with her_?

Marlene reached out an arm to pull her into what must be the living room. "This is Lily," she said, "She's just escaped the suburbs. Lily, this is everyone."

Lily raised a hand in a nervous hello.

"She's wearing fucking sandals," said a boy sat on in an armchair, "why'd you let her in if she's wearing sandals?"

"Fuck off, Potter," Marlene snapped, "Lily, that's James, he's an arsehole."

The boy gave her a mock salute. He was about her age, skinny, with spiky, but messy, black hair and glasses.

"And next to him is Sirius, he's also an arsehole," A handsome boy in a leather jacket nodded at Lily.

"Careful, Marlene," said a shabby looking boy in the corner, "you'll put her off."

"I'm telling the truth," Marlene shrugged, "that's Remus; he's alright. Then there's Peter," Peter waved eagerly, "and over there's Dorcas- that's who you heard shout-"

"Well I wouldn't have shouted if Sirius hadn't-" piped up a small girl with a head full of tight, brown curls.

"Alright, alright Dor," Marlene waved her off and turned her gaze to the group sat on the armchairs, "Matt, Gid, Fab, Bonehead you already know…" the band winked at Lily, and she had to suppress a blush, "Ben Fenwick, Emmeline Grove- so called because she's the only one of us who grew up here- Orla, Alex, Dedalus- Ded, why aren't you at work?- aaaand….where's everyone else?"

"Out," said James, "Dumbledore's having a fight with the council-"

"About what?"

"Not paying tax on this place I guess- Cee's working, Sturgis is in Manchester, Caradoc and Bron are downstairs, Minnie's-"

"Don't call her Minnie, James," Dorcas sighed at him.

"Fuck off, Field- Minnie's God knows where, and Mad Eye's doing something with his kids I think."

"No Frank and Al?"

"Baby related shit."

"Well why the fuck aren't you lot busy if everyone else is?" Marlene threw herself down on an ugly green sofa. Lily felt horribly self conscious, though no one was looking at her.

"Because," Dorcas threw a pillow at her, "it's the first of September. We're holding a service in honour of those being forced to go through the repression system."

"She means the education system," Marlene told Lily, "Sit down, Ginge- what, Dor, people are forced to go to school and suddenly the two percent doesn't matter? Don't forget- _the rich are always there_."

"It's just one day," Dorcas stuck her tongue out, "anyway- where're you from again, Lily?"

"Um…" all eyes were on her, "Cokeworth? It's in Surrey…"

"Surrey's a shithole!" Sirius groaned, "what'd'you wanna live there for?"

"I didn't choose to!" Lily found herself snapping, "I was born there, I didn't ask for it!"

"Fair enough," he shrugged. Lily was taken aback by his lack of fight- everyone else seemed so _passionate_.

"Sirius is too lazy to be a full time anarchist," Marlene explained, "so he's just here for the violence, aren't you, darling?"

"Piss off McKinnon," he replied lazily, leaning back into his armchair, "you're just jealous because I chose the cause over you."

"Not this again…" the shabby boy- Remus- groaned.

"Don't play Enjorlas; I wouldn't touch you with a barge pole, boy, and don't you forget it," Marlene quipped back, "Lily sit _down, _for Christ's sake!"

Lily sat obediently, on the arm of the sofa that Marlene was sprawled over. She felt nervous and squirmy and she was breaking out in a cold sweat. What had she been _thinking_? What had possessed her to even consider upping all her sticks and _living with a gang of anarchists_? What in God's name was wrong with her?

Her stomach rumbled, and every eye turned to her. "Sorry," she mumbled, "I didn't have any breakfast…"

"Seriously?" the bespectacled boy- James- laughed, "You ran off without even eating? Are you thick? Do we look like we run a fucking _bakery_? Jesus, McKinnon, why'd you let the spoilt white girl in?"

"Firstly," Marlene (_Marlene McKinnon_ Lily realised) snapped, "_you're _one to talk about being a spoilt white girl, and secondly, Ginge did a bunk, is it any wonder she didn't stop to eat?"

"Come to think of it," Sirius stretched, and Marlene rolled her eyes, "I'm _starving_. Anything in the cupboards?"

"I checked last night- I had the munchies- and we had nothing," the dark haired girl Marlene had called Orla said flippantly, "I think it's time to go to Figgy's."

"Not for me," Gideon grinned, "I've a girl the other side of the river-"

"Yeah, yeah, we know," his brother grumbled, "just because you're getting laid and we're not…"

"You just have to ask, Fab," Marlene purred, "you just have to ask."

"Oi!" her brother snapped, "you're underage, missy!"

"Fuck _off_, Matt," Marlene rolled onto her back as she lay on the sofa, and her hair fell into Lily's lap and gleamed in the sunlight, "Fab's underage too!"

"Dumbledore's not given the cause this house so you can nick people's virginities, Marlene; we're supposed to be a revolution."

"Is that what you're doing?" Lily said suddenly. She'd been slightly awestruck by the barrage of information just thrown over her; Gideon had a girlfriend, there was no food, somebody called Dumbledore owned the house, Marlene nicked people's virg-_oh shit Lily, you've just signed up for a sex ring, what in the name of the stars are you doing? _"You're a revolution?"

There was a titter from James, and she shot him a glare. Why was he _doing _that?

"No shit, Subs," he smirked, "what did you think this was, book club?"

"I thought you were punks, _actually_," she wrinkled her nose in disgust at him, "what are _you_; merchandise boy?"

"What I do is none of your business," he ruffled his hair, "so you can fuck right off."

"Likewise," Lily replied icily. Marlene smiled at her approvingly.

"James is a knob," the blonde girl said to the redhead, "but he'll grow on you."

"Like a tumour?" Lily deadpanned, "Or a dandelion?"

Marlene smirked. "Exactly like a dandelion. You're alright though, Ginge?"

"I'm really hungry…"

"Ask and you shall receive, oh my ginger. OI! Orla!" Marlene threw a cushion to the other side of the room, and it hit the side of Orla's head.

"WHAT?"

"Figgy's!"

"I haven't got any cash!" the dark haired girl responded, "Anyone?"

There was shuffling and mumbling and a lot of swearing, and eventually the group produced five pounds fifteen and six buttons. Lily sat there awkwardly, having spent all her Emergency Mars Bar money on the phone call to her mother.

"Excellent!" Orla stuffed the money in the front pocket of her dungarees, and half-skipped out of the room. "By-y-y-e-e-e-e!"

There were mumbled byes, and see-you-laters, and then Gideon stood. "Well," he said, "off to see Hestia!"

"Have fun," Marlene stretched her neck so she could look him in the eye, "use protection."

"You sicken me."

"And you, I."

Gideon flicked her hair onto her face, "Don't sleep with my brother."

"I'll try not to," she sat up, "Lily, your clothes are awful. Is this _corduroy_?"

Lily pulled at her skirt, as the other anarchists began to stir into life; Matt had picked up his guitar, Alex was reading, and the awful _James _was watching her with a smirk on his face, tossing a tennis ball from one hand to the other.

"Well, I…I quite like this skirt…"

James snorted, and Lily frowned. "What is your _problem_?"

"I don't have a problem," he ruffled his hair again, and all of a sudden Lily had the urge to _rip every hair off his head_. "Have you got a problem, Subs?"

"No." she replied shortly.

"Then why are you here?"

"Because," Marlene chipped in (Lily wished she hadn't, she could fight these battles on her own) "she's bored, aren't you, Ginge?"

She nodded quickly. He kept _looking _at her, eyes sparkling in the sunlight, like she was _interesting_. She wished he wouldn't.

"C'mon, Ginge," Marlene nudged her (it was only then that Lily realised she'd been staring at James for quite some time now; he was smirking) "Dor's got some jeans for you…"

Lily snapped her eyes away from James. "Sorry?"

"Dorcas." Marlene said slowly, "Has got. Some jeans. For you."

"Right…"

"Hey. Subs?" James threw his tennis ball at her, and it bounced off the side of her arm.

"_What?_"

"You look alright in the corduroy; don't let The Blondes tell you any different."

"Fuck off, Potter," Marlene snapped, "we can't let her go about in _that_, she'll get slaughtered."

"She can wear what she fucking likes, McKinnon. Tell her, Moony!"

He glanced over at Shabby Looking Remus, who was sat on the windowsill, reading a book. He looked up, and seemed to stifle a sigh. "Yes, James?"

"Tell Blondie One that Subs can wear whatever she likes."

Remus looked Lily in the eye and said calmly; "Are you happy with what you're wearing, Lily?"

"I suppose so…"

"Then Marlene really has no right to tell you what to wear. Sorry, Marlene."

Marlene mumbled something that sounded a little like "you're all fucking squares," and then with a toss of her hair, she flounced- there really is no other word for it- to the other side of the room, where she sat beside Alex, and looked through a box of records.

The hours passed slowly, but Lily was not bored; there was activity, always, a conversation or a debate or a record to listen to, and people were _always_ interested in what she had to say.

Emmeline wanted to know her opinions on Huxley and Orwell; Remus asked her about music; Fabian showed her his guitar, and taught her how to play the A chord; Dorcas gave her a stack of _NMEs _that, the brunette told her proudly, she had contributed to; Orla- when she returned, armed with a box of Frosties, a loaf of bread and a jar of jam- wanted to know her thoughts on a skirt. As they ate, Ben Fenwick asked her about Petunia, and the secretary nonsense, and everyone sighed at the state of society, and what a ridiculous thing a secretarial college was ('all it is, is fucking _typing_' Marlene complained) and it felt like _family_. Which was strange, because she'd been there less than a day.

The only problem was _James_. Everyone seemed to adore him, which she didn't understand (although he was quite funny) because he made nasty jokes about people in magazines, and scoffed at whatever Lily said or did (and Lily responded by poking her tongue out at him, and calling him an arse).

And then, it was half past eight and everyone made stretching movements and began talking about pub-or-club, or whether they should wait for Celia and was Gid coming back tonight, and Lily realised then that this _was _a family; that these people were closer than brothers or sisters. And perhaps, just perhaps, she could be part of it.


	5. Bigmouth Strikes Again

**author's note: oh wow thank you all so much for the lovely reviews! i hope you enjoy this chapter just as much as you've enjoyed the other four!**

**disclaimer: (just realised i've not actually done one of these oops) i don't own these characters or the smiths. or the arctic monkeys. or journey. or devo. or basically any of the bands whose songs i used as titles.**

* * *

_Bigmouth Strikes Again_

_Sweetness, sweetness I was only joking when I said_

_By rights you should be bludgeoned in your bed_

* * *

Lily didn't come face to face with Dumbledore until she had been living at the house- sleeping on a blow up mattress on Marlene's bedroom floor, and whiling away her mornings and afternoons and evenings by reading and talking and laughing- for three days. She had met a dozen different people during that time; Mrs. Figg, who ran the corner shop down the road; Celia, who they had waited for on the first night of Lily's time there, a small and skinny actress, who barely reached Lily's shoulders and possessed a mane of dark brown hair, an olive complexion and a wicked sense of humour; Hestia, Gideon's girlfriend, a bassist in a punk band in Camden; Bert Aubrey, who ran the record shop on the High Street; Caradoc and Bronwyn Dearborn, a married couple who lived in the basement of the house, and had turned it into a café ("Bron makes the best Victoria Sponge in London" Marlene told Lily); Sturgis Podmore, a little round man who owned a record label, and occasionally fell asleep on the graying mattress under the window in the back room, and Minerva McGonagall, a school teacher who James (who grew more and more annoying with each passing minute) called Minnie.

It was a Wednesday, and Lily was listening to the radio in the back room, lying across the sofa and lazily reading the paper. She was alone- Marlene had gone with the band to _finally _record a demo tape, Dorcas was in the kitchen, pretending to write an article for a magazine, but actually just drinking tea and the so-called Marauders had not even got out of bed yet. Everyone else was working, or at least had not been there when Lily woke up.

There was a creaking noise that came from the front door, but she assumed that was Celia or Alex or one of the many other people who drifted in and out of the house during the day. She ignored it, and carried on reading a piece on the water shortage (_that's what happens in a heat wave_, she thought) until a quiet voice said, "Lily Evans, I believe?"

No one had called her that since she'd left Cokeworth. She sat bolt upright, the name _Evans_ feeling cold and uncomfortable to her ears. In the doorway, stood a tall man, with thinning auburn hair. He wore a sharp grey suit and Doc Martens, his face was lined and etched with worry, but his blue eyes sparkled as he smiled down at her.

"No need to worry," he said calmly, "I'm not going to send you back to Surrey."

"Thanks," she replied quietly, "and you are-?"

He chuckled, and sat beside her on the armchair.

"Albus Dumbledore. Rather ugly, don't you think?" he remarked lightly, gesturing to the sofa, "Miss McKinnon is always on at me to get a new one, but I find that just because something is ugly, doesn't mean it's not worth having. Don't you?"

She nodded. _What a strange man_, she thought with a smile. "I feel that way about jumpers."

Dumbledore beamed at her. "Yes," he said, more to himself than to her, "yes, I see what Marlene means now…"

Lily didn't understand what he meant, and neither did she ask. Dumbledore did not seem the type of man to just _tell _you what he was thinking.

"I hope you don't mind my being here…" Lily said to him, "it's just… Marlene said this is a doss house."

"And she'd be right," he replied absentmindedly, picking up the paper Lily had abandoned, "although I can't say I like the phrase 'doss house'. It sounds cheap, don't you think?"

She nodded. "It's more like…it's a home, isn't it?"

"Oh yes," he replied good naturedly, "I'd say we're a family. And that's what I wanted to talk to you about. There's, ah, a group of people…a gang, really, that don't approve of what we're doing here. And if…if you're ever scared, Lily, or hurt, we will do our damnedest to help you. Do you understand?"

She nodded again. He smiled gratefully, and stood to leave.

"Oh," he said in an offhand fashion, "Miss McKinnon tells me you're not getting on well with James?"

"I-" Lily was slightly shocked that Marlene had even _picked up_ on the frosty atmosphere between the pair.

"Don't be too harsh on him," Dumbledore warned, "you will come to rely on each member of this house at least once."

And then he nodded politely, and went on his way.

Lily sat back on the sofa, and thought hard. Somewhere in the hall, she could hear Dorcas chatting eagerly to Dumbledore, but she was not concentrating on that. What did he _mean_? Why would she ever come to rely on James? If she was being perfectly honest, she could not ever imagine being _friends _with James. What a strange man…

"I hear Albus paid you a visit," Remus said to her (_oh so at least one of that bloody gang had gotten up)_ as they sat at the kitchen table for lunch - Dorcas was making steak-and-ale pie, and Lily had been told not to miss it.

"Who?"

"Dumbledore- Albus Dumbledore. Marlene said he popped round."

"What? Oh- yeah…yeah, he did. No more carrots for me, thanks Dor!" she waved the plate away, and Dorcas pulled a face.

"Interesting, isn't he?" Remus said slowly, cutting up his pie carefully.

Lily nodded. "I couldn't help feeling," she mused, "that he was…I dunno, _examining me_? Like I was undergoing some kind of test? Do you understand what I mean?"

Remus looked at her, his eyes sad (they were always sad, but Lily couldn't think why) but kind. "Yes," he said eventually, "yes, I see exactly what you mean."

"He kept saying all these things that Marlene had told him about me," the redhead continued, "but I don't know when she told him; he's not been here."

"She'll have telephoned him the night after you arrived," Remus explained, "the McKinnons and Dumbledore are very tight knit."

"Why is that?" Lily wondered, and Remus shrugged.

"I think their father was close with him; I don't really know. He's a fascinating man, Dumbledore, but he keeps his cards close to his chest. As do a lot of us I suppose…" and he trailed off, and looked away from Lily.

"Yes…" she murmured, thinking of _Evans_, "Yes I suppose we do…"

She was pulled out from her reverie by a crash in the hall, and Marlene stormed in, blue eyes blazing and hair a mess.

"The fucking Teddy boys," she spat, "have fucking attacked _Cee _on her way to work. They attacked _Cee_! I'm fuming." And she sat beside Remus, a frown etched on her pretty features.

"Teddy boys?" Lily asked with a laugh, "is this 1957?"

Marlene snorted harshly. "They hate us. Tell her, Dor."

Dorcas sighed sadly, and picked at the pastry of her pie. "It's gang mentality, Lily. There's a kind of…well, they think we're on their turf, and that the boys'll steal their girls and they're…I mean, they're very violent, and this isn't…this isn't a safe place, I hope you-"

"Do you mind?" Remus asked quietly. His face had blanched at news of Cee's attack, and now he looked at Lily, eyes full of sincerity.

She thought for a moment. She thought of life in Surrey, and the way the most exciting thing that happened was a new brand of cornflakes, and she thought of the way that her mother had sounded on the telephone, and she looked Remus deep in his brown eyes and replied; "I don't mind at all."

The other three Marauders did not emerge until after lunch; they sauntered down the stairs, shouting and laughing.

"Oi oi!" called James, "it's Ginge!"

"You seem remarkably cheerful," Lily replied from the kitchen doorway, "considering that Celia is in the hospital."

"You're kidding?" Peter yelped, but Lily ignored him.

"You know, if you'd got up earlier, like Remus," she continued, "then you could be at the hospital right now, with Dorcas and Marlene."

James mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like 'I'm not going anywhere with that bitch'. Sirius gave him a look, but said nothing.

"There's no need to be so rude, you know," Lily told him, "and Marlene's not a bitch."

James scoffed, and ran a hand through his hair. "Look, Subs, you don't know her. Dossing on a mattress in her room for a week doesn't make you her best mate, alright?"

"Because you are?" she snapped back. Who the hell did he think he was, telling her how she much she knew someone?

"James…" Sirius nudged him, but he didn't look away from Lily.

"I know McKinnon better than you, and I'll tell you this for free; she's not going to save your life, and she's not an angel. So take her off that pedestal you've got her on, and open your eyes."

"God," Lily sneered, "are you always this rude?"

"Are you always this naiive?"

Sirius cleared his throat, and Lily's eyes snapped to him. "_What_?"

"I think you're missing the point," he drawled, "Cee's in the hospital because of some twat, and you two are stood here arguing?"

"What else are we supposed to do?" Lily rolled her eyes; why were these boys such _idiots_?

"Beat the fuckers up," Sirius smirked, "it'll be those fucking Teddy boys, won't it?"

"Marlene says-"

"I'm sure she does."

"Shut _up_, James. Marlene says it was. Do you know them?"

Sirius laughed coldly. "Yeah, you could say that."

"What are you going to do them?"

Sirius threw an arm around Pete's shoulder, and gestured to the door. "C'mon Pete."

"What about Remus?" James asked. Sirius shrugged.

"He'll catch us up, won't it? Oh, and Ginge?" Sirius smiled at the girl; "Spread the word; Alex'll be out for blood."

"I'll tell everyone," she promised. He nodded courteously, and off they went, half the Marauders, leaving Lily alone with James.

"What're they going to do?" she asked him quietly. A sigh escaped his lips, and he scratched the back of his neck, a sad smile on his face.

"Beat the shit out of them, Subs," he replied, "did you not know what anarchists do?"

"Yeah, 'course!" she folded her arms defensively, "I just thought…"

"You thought we were all intellectuals, right? Yeah, most of them do. But I'll let you in on a secret, right?"

He leant into her, so all she could see was his hazel eyes and the thick black rims of the glasses that framed them.

"We're all animals, Subs."

"Why'd you call me that?" she asked. He was still in her face, and her cheeks were flushing.

"Short for suburbs," he grinned crookedly, "I'm just reminding yourself of where you're from."

"I don't need reminding," she breathed, his eyes still burning into hers.

"I'll be the judge of that, thank you."

And he turned to leave, and she thought that there was a draught; it seemed colder somehow.

* * *

Alex arrived home at half past two, caked in sweat and mud. Lily ran to him as soon as he stepped through the door.

"Have you heard?" she asked worriedly. The look on his face told her he hadn't.

"Heard what…?" he replied, hand in his hair. Lily reached out and took his hand; it was clammy.

"Alex…Alex, its Celia. She's, um, she's in the hospital. The Teddy-"

His face whitened considerably, and for a moment he swayed on the spot. Lily stopped her explanation, and grabbed his arm to stop him falling.

"Will you take me to her?" he asked quietly. She nodded, and a little colour returned to his cheeks.

"Lily…" he muttered so quietly she had to strain her ears to hear him, "Lily, how bad is it?"

For a moment, she was quiet, her lips pressed together to stop herself from crying. Devastation was never pleasant to watch, especially when you were the one who delivered the news that caused it.

"Lily," Alex said again, and she knew she had to answer.

"I don't know," she replied truthfully, "Marlene and Dorcas have gone. I said I'd stay…"

Still pale, he gripped the door handle. "I'll-" Lily began, but Alex shook his head.

"I'll find her," he said, "I always do."

And with that, he left.

Lily sank back against the bannister, and clutched her forehead in her hands. This was _exhausting_. The look on Alex's face, the way his jaw set in resignation, like he'd been _expecting _it.

She didn't think she could do it anymore.

"Was that Alex?" a voice came from the top of the stairs – James. Lily spun around, to see him sauntering down the stairs, tossing an apple from one hand to the other.

"Yeah…" she replied. There was a lump in her throat, and her eyes felt so heavy with sadness. "He…he really loves her, doesn't he?"

James shrugged. "Yeah," he replied, "I guess he does."

Lily turned back around as James stepped off the stairs, and for a second she closed her eyes. _I did not sign up for this sadness_, she thought.

"How long have they been together?" she asked quietly, looking him right in his eyes. Why didn't he _care_? Why was he so cool and collected at a time like this?

To her great surprise, he snorted. "They're not- oh God, Subs, you thought-?" he laughed heartily, still tossing that blasted apple from one hand to the other. "Subs, they're not- they're not _together_!"

"But he loves her!" she protested. James ran a hand through his hair, and smiled crookedly.

"Yeah, but not like _that_. There _are _other types of love, you know."

"Obviously, I just…"

"Yeah, yeah, you just assumed, I-"

"Will you _stop_?" It was like something inside her snapped, and she turned on James with rage burning in her bright green eyes. "Will you just _stop_? For one minute, _please_!"

"Stop doing what?" the boy folded his arms.

"Acting like you know everything!" Lily snapped, and he rolled his eyes carelessly.

"You walk around this house like you _own_ it, and you treat people like _shit_, and my God, you're so _arrogant_-"

"If you're done assassinating my character, Subs-"

"Well I'm not, alright? I haven't even started on how you talk about Marlene, or the way you treat Peter-"

A thin hand flew to his hair, and Lily resisted the urge to bat it away.

"Don't bring _my _mates into this, Subs, you know fuck all about us."

"He worships you," Lily continued, "and you act like he's not there. The only person _you _care about, James Potter, is _yourself_."

There was silence for a moment. James looked at her, nostrils flaring slightly_._ She shrugged heartlessly, and he rolled his eyes.

"Finished?"

"Yes," she replied crisply.

"Fan-fucking-tastic," he muttered, "now if you'll excuse me, I've got a Teddy boy to beat the shit out of…"

He sauntered to the front door (but something was lacking from his strut, she noticed) and she waited until he was half way out before calling to him.

"Wait!" she said, "wait, I'll…I'll come with you."

"Seriously?"

"I'm not much use here," she told him, "and I'd feel like I'm intruding if I went to the hospital."

James said nothing, instead, he dug around in his pocket, and produced a key.

"I dunno if Marlene gave you one," he mumbled, "but here." He pressed the key into her pale hand, and glanced into her eyes. "Don't lose it, alright?"

"I won't," she replied, stuffing the key in the pocket of her jeans.

"Right then," he winked at her (_and she might've blushed_) "brave heart, Subs. Brave heart."

* * *

Alastor Moody was fifty one, five foot eight, and only in possession of one of his eyes. The other, he'd lost- rumour has it- in a fight with his wife's lover fifteen years ago. Or there was that story that it was the armed robber wot dunnit.

Regardless of how it happened, the fact was that with one eye, and a sneer that could frighten the bravest of the brave, he cut an impressive figure, squared up to a slick looking Teddy boy (perhaps 'Teddy man' is a more accurate description), a man with waxy features and thin, red rimmed eyes.

The other Marauders stood behind him, poised as if ready for a fight. There was a gang around the man that Moody was arguing with, too, including one thin, pale witchy looking woman who had one bony hand on his shoulder; he was obviously the leader.

James ran ahead of her, down the cracked pavements. Lily followed quickly, not wanting to miss anything. The air crackled with excitement; the anticipation was half the fun of it.

James' pace quickened, and Lily was beginning to get a stitch (_damn Dorcas' pie_) and so to slow him down, she leant forward to grab his arm. Only, she missed and caught his hand and when he looked around the look of surprise in his eyes made her catch her breath.

But he cleared his throat nervously, and she dropped his hand like it had burnt her.

"Sorry," she mumbled, "I've got a stitch…"

For a moment he was silent, and she cursed herself for not taking better aim, but then-

"S'alright, Subs," he smirked, "I'll walk with you." A pause. "Still wanna hold my hand?"

She giggled. "Piss off."

"Charming."

Sirius gave them a nod of recognition as they approached the crowd. Moody was ranting, raving.

"Think you're the big man, do you Riddle?" Moody spat, "Getting your groupies to attack a teenage girl on her way to work? And you say _we're_ violent and dangerous!"

"The girl provoked Bella," Riddle hissed, "she was asking for it!"

"I don't think anyone asks to get slashed in the face with a razor," James muttered quietly. Lily looked at him; his fists were clenched and he was shaking, and suddenly she was struck with the realization that these people really _were _family. James would probably have looked less upset if someone had insulted his mother.

"That tart was asking for it, like Tom said," sneered the skinny woman (_who, Lily thought with a jolt, had been responsible for Celia's attack_) "walking around like she owns the place. What is it she does do again? Whoring?"

"You would know," Sirius spat venomously. The girl, Bella, laughed cruelly.

"You picked the wrong crowd to run around with, cousin," she said, "riff raff and whores! And who is this?" She turned to Lily, who silently begged her already milky white skin not to go any paler and reveal her fear. "Some slut you picked up from SoHo, Sirius?"

There was a roar of rage as James lunged forward, and then all was lost to blood red.

* * *

She was drowning, she couldn't breathe, and all there was in the world was arms and legs and teeth and spit. Someone had grabbed the back of her head, was pulling her down by her hair, and she fought for breath. Her knees were moments from giving way, but she pushed forward, pushed at the faceless, heartless attacker, and they fell with a thud.

She did not stop to see who it was, but carried on forward, still crushed by the herd.

To her right, she could see Remus, shoving through a crowd of immaculately dressed women. Lily could practically smell the _Daily Mail _on them. The crowd, fronted by a fierce looking blonde girl, weren't letting him through, and he was arguing with them.

But Lily couldn't hear what was being said, such was the volume of the blood rushing through her ears. A kick winded her, a punch bruised her arm, but she fought on, spitting fire. A hand grabbed her ankle, and she tried to shake it off, but it pulled at her and pulled at her, and she fell to the ground, grazing her head on the stony tarmac.

If this was how she was going to die, then so be it.

She was bleeding, and someone was punching her, pummeling her arms and her stomach and her face. Her arms ached, and her hands were grazed, and then she heard a shriek. Her attacker- Bella, who up close was revealed wild looking pale girl with jet black hair and crimson red nails- was being hauled off her by a tall and skinny boy. Was being hauled off her by James.

She was shrieking, and kicking, and James gave Lily a nod, as if to say 'go; I will deal with this nutter'.

Lily didn't need telling twice. She scrambled to her feet, and ran on, even though her knees were bruised and her head was thumping. She had to find somewhere where she could _breathe_.

Lily had lost sight of Remus, and Peter was to her left, being beaten by a man in a leather jacket. Wiping the blood from her eyes, she grabbed Peter's hand and pulled him away, and the man in the jacket took to hitting her instead. But she couldn't feel it. She couldn't feel anything, nor see anything, or hear anything, just a voice in her head crying for safety.

"Where's Sirius?" she asked Peter, "where's Sirius?"

He shook his head, he didn't know, he didn't know, and Lily let out a stifled sob. Half of her wanted to carry on fighting, to make them pay for the hurt they had caused Celia, and the other half wanted to lie down and die. She ached all over, and she could no longer tell if the blood that stained her jumper was hers or not.

* * *

They took refuge in a pub, where the barman (a kindly looking man named Tom) gave them each a brandy on the house. Lily was tended to by Emmeline, who was working as the barmaid, and who clucked when she saw her cuts and bruises, and reminded Lily so much of her mother that she wanted to cry.

"You'll have a nasty scar in your hairline," the stately looking woman told her, "but none on your pretty face, dear." She brushed the hair out of Lily's eyes. "So young," she murmured, "so young to be fighting so many."

"Aren't you young?" Lily asked her, and then wished she hadn't.

Emmeline chuckled. "Sometimes I am. And other times I am one hundred and three, and wish for nothing more than death to sweep me up in his arms and let me sleep."

"Is that Keats?"

"Cheeky mare." She laughed again, and sent Lily on her way.

James Potter sat with his fellow Marauders, sporting a large bruise on his cheekbone, and a gash to the forehead. He gave her a polite nod as she passed, but said nothing. Remus caught her arm.

"You're all right?"

"Emmeline said I'll have a scar, but nothing too serious. You?"

"Bit battered, but I'll be okay. Have you heard anything about Cee?"

"Nothing; I'm thinking of going over there later."

"Well we're not going with you," James muttered.

"I didn't ask you to."

"Why do you even care about Cee, Subs?"

"Because we're friends."

"_We're _not friends, though," he replied.

"Then _why_," he was _smirking _at her, and even the way he was _breathing, _like he _couldn't_, like she was causing some kind of blockage in his lungs, _infuriated _her, "did you risk your own arse and get rid of that psycho out there?"

Sirius rounded on James, suddenly interested. "Yeah, James? Why _did_ you risk your own arse out there in order to save Ginge?"

James looked at her, nostrils flaring slightly. But he wasn't looking at her like he hated her; it was weird, it was like she'd woke him up, and he needed a few more hours sleep. He was begging her; _please, please I'm not ready._ She shrugged heartlessly, and he rolled his eyes.

"Because I didn't want you to die, Subs, alright?" he downed his brandy, and screwed up his nose. "Is that a crime?"

She couldn't feel sorry for him; because he was rude and cold (_but made her skin feel like it was on fire_). She said nothing to him, but nodded at Remus, and went to sit down next to Moody, who was cradling a glass of whiskey, and reading a newspaper.

And her skin was extinguished, and all was cold again.


	6. Riot Van

**A/N: this chapter is dedicated to Tate (Somewhat Quirky), who I love dearly. Happy birthday, angel face!**

**Disclaimer: yeah, i don't own any of this. **

* * *

Riot Van

_Up rolls a riot van_

_And sparks excitement in the boys_

* * *

Celia Mitchell lay cold and pale in her hospital bed. Stitches ran along her left cheek, down to her jaw and up to her forehead. The skin around the stitches was red and puffy, and her eyes were closed; she was sleeping. Alex was too, in the chair next to her bed, still gripping his dear friend's thin hand, curled up like a cat.

Marlene and Dorcas sat in silence on the floor by the window, and Lily felt like she was interrupting some kind of vigil.

They said nothing as she entered the hospital room, but Dorcas' large green eyes widened in horror when she saw Lily's cuts and bruises. The red head waved in a nonchalant way that she hoped suggest that her injuries were nothing (which they were, really, in contrast to Celia's).

"Come sit here," Dorcas whispered, "we're waiting for her to wake up."

Marlene said nothing, but locked her eyes to the sign that read 'Mitchell, Celia' on the back of the door. Her jaw was set, like she was trying not to give anything away. Her walls, one might say, were up.

"How was it?" Dorcas asked Lily as she sat beside her. Her jeans were caked in blood; she was surprised that they let her in (perhaps they thought she was a patient…)

"It was tough," she answered truthfully, "but not as tough as being here, I reckon,"

There was silence, and Dorcas patted Lily's arm affectionately. After a while, the brunette spoke softly.

"The waiting, I think," she said, "is the hardest. She'll be alright; people who are made of sunshine always are, but waiting for it…? It's tough, y'know?"

Lily looked over at Alex and Celia; yes, she knew.

"Made of sunshine…" she smiled in spite of the situation they were in, "I like that…"

"You've got a scar," Marlene said suddenly, thickly, like she was full of tears, "they fucking _scarred _you."

"Cee's is worse," Lily replied, "mine's a nick compared to hers…"

There was a movement from the bed, and all eyes snapped to the sleeping girl. But it was nothing; Celia had merely moved, dropped Alex's hand, and now slept on her side, her stitches gleaming in the harsh artificial light.

"How's James?" Dorcas asked quietly.

"He…he is…" Lily couldn't find the words; how could she talk of James when she was covered in blood that was not her own, when she was sat in a hospital with a girl that was most probably scarred for life? In the end, she decided to tell the truth, because the truth was always easier than a lie.

"He confuses me," she confessed, "he acts like I…we bicker, constantly, but that Bella woman insulted me, and he just _went _for her, and he's rude and cold to me, but I accidentally held his hand and I swear to God, Dor, I thought his face was alight with happiness…"

Dorcas caught Marlene's eye, and both girls grinned widely. The grins became bursts of laughter, and the bursts of laughter became yelps, and the yelps became so loud they might awake the dead. Indeed, they woke Alex, who stirred and mumbled in his sleep, and rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand.

Lily, meanwhile, could not fathom for the life of her what was so _funny_ about the whole thing.

"Why are you _laughing_?" she asked (but a smile was creeping onto her lips too) "What's so _funny_?"

Marlene snorted loudly, and Dorcas cackled more.

"Wuzzgoin' on?" Alex grumbled, and the brunette swallowed down her giggles.

"_James,_" Dorcas beamed, "has pulled a Doc on Ginge here."

"A _what_?" the aforementioned Ginge spluttered.

Alex sighed, but a smile crept onto his previously worried face. "You'll wake Cee," he warned, but Marlene just laughed harder.

"Good!" declared the Scottish girl, "Then we can get out of here sooner! I bloody hate hospitals!"

Dorcas' smile dimmed a little; "This isn't about you, Marlene-" she began, but Alex, who seemed to sense the tension (not that it was hard, thought Lily, it seemed visibly darker without Dorcas' grin) interrupted her.

"Someone tell Ginge the story of Doc and Bron, so she'll understand," he said quickly.

"You do it, Al," Dorcas replied, "You're the best story teller out of all of us."

"Says the writer," Marlene pointed out.

"Alex is an actor, McKinnon, he can do voices," the brunette smirked, "won't you, Al?"

"I will try." Alex promised, "Now, Ginge. Are you sitting comfortably?"

Lily leant back against the radiator. "Now I am," she said.

"Then I'll begin. Long ago, in like, 1974 or something-"

"That was two years ago."

"_Yes Marlene thank you for your input_. As I was saying, long ago, two years ago, Bronwyn Dearborn- or Bronwyn Jones, as she was then- moved to the Big Smoke to become open a bakery-"

"Bron doesn't own a-" Lily began

"We're getting to that, Ginge. Anyway. So there she was, alone in this huge city with just a recipe book and a pocket full of dreams, and she does what any sensible and reasonable person does. She moves into a very dangerous squat with an old school friend."

"Who's the old-?"

"Shh! Listen!" Dorcas sat up straight, grinning with childish glee.

"The old school friend doesn't live with us anymore, but that's not the point. The point _is_, is that also living in this squat was Caradoc Dearborn, who Bron didn't know very well. And they fought like _cat and dog_. Their arguments are the stuff of legend, I swear. Caradoc claimed it was because Bronwyn acted like she ran the place, and that she was so single minded that she didn't think about The Cause, and Bron says it was because Caradoc was rude first, and she's a member of the 'respect has to be earned' school of thought. So, they bicker _constantly _for six months, until one day things got horribly out of hand-" at this point, Alex adopted a thick Welsh accent- "'you're nasty and arrogant and I doubt you'll ever open that bloody bakery you keep harping on about'-"

"Note, please, Lily," Marlene chipped in, "that we don't _actually _know what was said. But the story is the stuff of legend."

"_Thank you for your input Marlene_. So anyway, Bronwyn was _so _upset by Doc's words that she threw a plant pot at him, and packed her bags to leave."

"Albus," Dorcas continued, "was devastated by this possible loss – he loves Bron's cake, see-"

"I thought I was telling this story, Miss Meadowes!" Alex protested. Dorcas giggled.

"Sorry."

"So you should be- anyway. So Albus goes and finds Doc, and he's really shaken up about the plant pot throwing and things, and they sit down and talk about it and Albus says something like-" he deepened his voice and spoke slowly, in what was really quite an accurate impression of Dumbledore, "'the line between love and hate is thin and you may have crossed it Caradoc' or something like that-"

"We think it might've been a quote from Oscar Wilde," Dorcas sighed, "he's always quoting Oscar Wilde."

"But anyway," Alex butted in, "Caradoc came to the conclusion- realized, really, that he was arguing with Bron because of _unresolved sexual tension_."

"Unresolved _what_?" Lily yelped. She hoped he hadn't just said what she thought he did. He couldn't have.

"Shhh, you'll wake Cee! And unresolved _sexual tension_."

"It's when two people hate each other so much they need to fuck," Marlene said, "_Jesus _I need a fag."

"Go and smoke outside then," Dorcas replied, "but yeah, Lily, that's what unresolved sexual tension is. And it's what, by the sounds of it, you and James have."

Lily was slightly taken aback. She didn't hate James so much she _loved _him, she just plain hated him. Right?

And anyway, there must more to the story of Bron and Doc; two people don't just go from hating each other to being married, do they?

"Well regardless of whether it's true for James and me," Lily tried to shrug off the accusations that she wanted to jump James Potter, "what happened with Bron and Caradoc? People don't just _bonk_ and then decide they want to get married."

Dorcas and Marlene shared a look that Lily couldn't decipher, and Alex took up the story.

"So Bron's standing on the platform at King's Cross Station, and she's waiting for the train to take her back to Cardiff, and suddenly she hears someone shout for her, so she looks round thinking it's probably her mate or someone, that she's forgotten something at the squat. But it's not. It's Caradoc. And she says to him 'ugh I was leaving to get rid of you', and he tells her, quite clearly, that they don't hate each other, they're just very attracted to each other-"

"To which Bronwyn was skeptical about, obviously," Dorcas continued, "I think she thought that he just wanted a lay. _But_! She could kind of see where he was coming from-"

"She told me it was because she wanted a lay too!" Marlene protested, but Dorcas ignored her.

"So she went back to the squat, and that night they had dinner together, on the grounds that there was to be no arguing…"

"And they've been together every night since," finished Alex, "they got married six months ago."

"How lovely," Lily replied, "but I don't want to shag James Potter. I want him to _stop_."

"Stop doing what?" Dorcas asked curiously.

"Stop looking at me in a way that makes me shiver," she responded (and she was surprised by how quickly the words fell from her lips), "stop making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, stop making my skin feel more like _skin_, y'know?"

Dorcas was silent for a moment. And then Marlene spoke with a wry grin;

"You _do _realize you've just described the feeling of fancying the pants off someone, right?"

"I didn't!"

"You did!" Marlene cackled, "You did, you did, you did!"

Lily opened and closed her mouth several times. She did _not _fancy James Potter; she would not even allow herself to entertain the idea, she would forget all about this unresolved sexual tension and concentrate on the matter in hand; Celia, and the fact that she was caked in blood that was not her own.

"Look," she told them, as they sat there chuckling, "just because this was true for the Dearborns doesn't mean it's true for James and me. And I really don't think that it's important in light of recent events." And with that, she nodded at Celia.

The hours seemed to tick by so slowly it was like watching paint dry. Celia did not awaken, and soon Alex dropped off again ("he's exhausted, bless him," Dorcas clucked as she draped a thin hospital blanket over his knees) and the nurses came and went, and never acknowledged the three girls sat on the floor, leant against the radiator. Lily wondered if they even saw them; they were hidden behind Celia's bed. At approximately half past nine, Albus Dumbledore strode into the room, arm in arm with Mrs. Figg, who had concern etched onto her aging features.

"Time to go now, girls," Dumbledore said softly, "Arabella will walk you home,"

"We don't need walking home, Albus," Dorcas replied, equally as softly, "We're girls, not infants."

"That may be, Dor," Mrs. Figg said, "but those monsters are still out there."

"What, and us walking with some little old lady's going to stop them is it?" Marlene scoffed. Dorcas gave a look, a look that said 'shut _up_ Marlene', and the blonde girl stuck out her chin in defiance.

"Miss McKinnon," Dumbledore said, a warning tone in his voice. Still Marlene said nothing, instead she got to her feet, and began to leave the room.

"Well c'mon then!" she said with a tone of false cheeriness, "let's go home with our great protector, Mrs. Arabella Figg!"

"Marlene, must you always-?" began Dorcas, but Marlene tossed her hair like she was preparing to go into battle. It suddenly occurred to Lily that James might've been right; Marlene wasn't going to save her life. How could anyone so childish save _anything_?

Silently, the three of them filed out of the hospital with Mrs. Figg, each preoccupied with their own thoughts and feelings.

* * *

Mrs. Figg was right; a gang of leather jacketed boys and girls were hanging around on the corner, and as they saw the four of them pass, they began to shout and jeer.

"_Punk scum!_" they yelled, "WHAT YOU'RE DRESSED LIKE THAT FOR, TARTS? OFF TO SUCK DUMBLEDORE'S COCK ARE WE?"

The jeers seemed to make Dorcas into a queen; she stood taller, and Lily could almost see the words deflecting off the steel she had wrapped herself in. Marlene, on the other hand, seemed to get hit by every insult, and it chipped away at her armour until she had nothing.

Lily was not frightened of them; sticks and stones and all that, but the sight of Marlene crumbling before her made her blood boil.

"D'you kiss your mum with that mouth?" she called over to them, and the girls- Bella, and the blonde girl Remus had argued with- cackled loudly.

"No, but we kiss yours!" an eerily pale blonde man shouted back. Dorcas spun on the spot (the words about her mother had riled her) and raised one hand, with her middle finger sticking up.

"Piss off!" she called (the calmness had been interrupted by a storm) "We don't want you here!"

There was a murmur from the crowd, and Bella almost fell forward in her eagerness to confront Dorcas. The air crackled with tension, and Lily found that she was rooted to the spot as Bella moved closer to the tiny brunette.

"Whore," she hissed, "common _tramp_." Dorcas did not flinch.

"I'd rather be a common tramp," she breathed, "than a greedy and cruel money grabber who no one cares for."

There was a muffled screech from Bella, and she grabbed Dorcas' tight curls in her pale hands, and drew her head to her knee. Dorcas made no sound, but reached up and pulled Bellatrix's hair. The thin woman hissed like a snake and slapped the brunette across the face. Her claws cut Dorcas' round cheeks and the blood dripped onto the sticky tarmac.

Marlene lunged forward and grabbed the back of Bella's head; Lily felt sick to her stomach as the blonde woman (_perhaps she was Bella's sister_) joined the fight, screeching obscenities and clawing at Marlene's back. Mrs. Figg made a noise like a strangled cat, but did not join them, and Lily found her feet carrying her to the crowd, her voice screeching like a banshee as she dragged Bella away from Dorcas, who spat blood onto the pavement. Lily tightened her grip around the attacker as she shrieked and writhed in her arms.

"LET ME GO, YOU FILTHY SLUT!" Bella screeched, and Lily merely dug her fingers deeper into the dark haired woman's arms. Dorcas wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and stormed towards Marlene, but the blonde seemed to need no help. She fought her attacker with ferocity and a constant energy that would have been admirable if it had not been so terrifying. The boys stood jeering and cat calling, but Lily could not seem to hear them; all she could hear was Marlene's screeches of rage as she walloped Bella's sister. She appeared to be winning, because she was the one least covered in blood, and the other girl appeared to be crying.

"FIGHT BACK!" Marlene roared, "FIGHT BACK, YOU COWARD!"

"Marlene," Lily wasn't even aware of speaking, "Marlene…"

"I SAID FIGHT BACK!" her friend was ignoring her, and the air had stopped crackling. It was just sad now, the sight of this ice queen half screaming at her mirror image, who curled up and sobbed. It made Lily's heart ache and her stomach churn.

Dorcas caught Lily's eye, but the redhead couldn't look back, it hurt too much. She had thought so _much _of Marlene, thought so much of her effortless attitude and her hair swishes and dirty laugh. But she didn't think a lot of the girl in front of her, caked in blood and gravel.

Dorcas sighed, like she'd done this before, and in one fluid movement managed to drag Marlene from the blonde girl's quivering body.

Marlene screamed, and Dorcas threw her on the floor with disgust.

"You monster!" screeched Bella, who ran to her sister's side, "You disgusting _whore_! We'll call the police."

Dorcas scoffed. "Call the fuzz on us, Lestrange, and we'll let slip exactly who slit Celia's face open. Both sides of this goddamn turf war have done some stupid shit," she paused, and helped Marlene up, "and we'd do well to keep the authorities out of it. None of us fancy a stretch in Holloway, do we?"

There was a mumble from the crowd, but Dorcas did not wait to hear their reply; she set off towards the house, walking like she was made of steel again, and Lily had to run to keep up with her.

The events of the last few days had drained our heroine, had exhausted her in ways she did not think it possible to be exhausted in, and it occurred to her as she lay on the blow up mattress in Marlene's bare floored room (Marlene who had not gone to bed, who Lily could hear downstairs, drinking and crying) that she had not called her mother since that first day. Her mother, who had mopped her tears and kissed her scraped knees and who did, in her own way, love her.

So, the next morning, at half past seven, when the rest of the house still slept, she gathered twenty five pence from coins that had been dropped between the floorboards and behind armchairs and on windowsills, and snuck out, to the phone box where Marlene had first found her.

Ring. Ring. Ri-i-i-n-g.

"Evans household, Petunia speaking."

"Tuney, it's me."

"Lily?"

"Yeah."

"Where is _God's name _are you? D'you know what we've had to tell the neighbours? We've had to tell them that you've gone to the seaside for your health! _For your health_! No one believes us, of course, we've had that greasy boy and the nervy girl you hung around with at school-"

"Sev and Mary?"

"Yes, them, they're here every other day, asking when you'll be back, you've driven Mother up the wall, she can't believe it, she's got a _runaway _for a daughter, Lily, do you know how _shameful _that is?"

Lily could almost _see _Petunia in her head, stood rigid like a board in their hallway, her thin blonde hair swished over her forhead in an attempt to look like Farrah Fawcett, the telephone cord wrapped around one bony finger, and a smirk on her face.

God, she couldn't _stand _Petunia.

"Tuney, I just want to talk to Mum."

"Well you can't." Lily suppressed an eye roll, which was silly, because Petunia couldn't _actually see her_.

"Why can't I?"

"She's in bed. Her nerves are shot. She thinks you're working as a prostitute." A pause. "You're _not _working as a prostitute, are you?"

"No, Petunia, I'm not."

"But even if you were," Petunia mused, "you'd say you weren't, just so we wouldn't come after you. See?"

"No I don't," she sighed, and sank back onto the little table where the phonebook lay, "I don't see. Care to explain?"

"No," Petunia replied in clipped tones, "I can't say I do." Another pause. "If you're not working as a prostitute…then what _are _you doing?"

Lily thought for a moment. What _was _she doing? She was sleeping on a deflating mattress, and reading music magazines until three, and eating lunch with a rock'n'roll band- wait, no, that's not what she was doing. That's not what she _had _been doing the last twenty four hours. She'd been bashed in the face and got dirt over Marlene's denim jacket and spent six hours in a tiny hospital room and she'd not slept in a proper bed in a week, oh God.

"I'm…I'm just sorting myself out." _A lie_.

"There's nothing to sort out, Lily! There is no reason why you shouldn't come home right now, and go to college like you talked about, you know, there is still a place for you,"

For a moment, Lily saw herself in her mind's eye, going home, sleeping in a warm bed with clean sheets and two pillows, eating breakfast at a normal time, never being scared of getting punched in the face as she walked down the street, knowing what she was doing every day, having a plan.

"Could I?" she heard herself muttering, mumbling like a child.

"Of course you could," Petunia replied.

"And everything," was she crying? She was crying, oh bloody fucking hell, she was not cut out for this, "could go back to how it was? Right?"

"Hmm, yes, well, I don't know about that," Petunia tittered, "you won't be able to go to those concert things that you and Mary attended- wasn't that where this whole thing started?"

Was it? She didn't think it was; she was drowning anyway, she would've done _something_ without that twenty minute set, without Marlene. Wouldn't she?

"Not really," she replied dully, "it started before that…"

"Well anyway," Petunia carried on regardless, "you _certainly _wouldn't be able to see any of the people you're currently hanging around with," she sniffed, and Lily rolled her eyes, "what do _they _do?"

"Petunia, I just want to talk to Mum, please," there was no point in talking to her, no point in answering her questions when she didn't listen to the answers. She just wanted her mum.

"I _told _you Lily, she's in bed, you- oh!" There was a mumbling on the other end, and Lily heard her father's voice, as steady and calm as it always had been, talking to Petunia. She could not decipher any words, but from the way her sister's voice got higher and higher in pitch and faster and faster in speed, she could gather that her father wanted to know who she was talking to, and Petunia wasn't co-operating.

"Dad!" she shouted down the phone, "Dad, it's me!" _Like he can hear you, Evans_, she thought bitterly. "Give him the phone, Petunia!"

Petunia didn't.

The noises grew louder; there seemed to be some sort of slanging match going on, but still all Lily could hear was the rustle of Petunia's sharp collar against the speaker.

_One last try, Evans_; "Tuney, give Dad the phone! Please!"

Nothing. A long, singular beep. Petunia had put the phone down, and Lily had no money left. _Oh bollocking fuck_. The tears kept falling down her cheeks, and she couldn't stop them. Scratch that, she didn't want to stop them. The enormity of the last few days kept hitting her like waves, and she felt like she had landed face first in the wet sand, and it had got all up her nose and in her eyes and her mouth. She wanted to spit it out, spit out the sand and the sadness, and she couldn't. She was drowning in it.

Ignoring the broken glass that littered the floor, she sank into a sitting position, head in hands, and she cried until she had no tears left.

James Potter had awoken early on that day too, because Sirius, who slept on a mattress next to his bed, was snoring, and he could hear someone on the landing, which never made it easy to sleep. He didn't want anyone fucking with his family (_of course, it could just be someone going to the loo, it was probably just someone going to the loo, but angry punks never _do _think rationally_)_. _And so he climbed out of bed, nimbly and quickly, and tiptoed out into the night.

It was Subs, which somehow didn't surprise him, and she was dressed in her funny little corduroy skirt and she'd wrapped herself in McKinnon's battered denim jacket, and she looked sad. He watched her slip out of the house in silence, and he wondered where she was going. She was strange, was Lily. She'd come in all guns blazing, but now he thought about it, it was like she didn't know what direction she was firing in. He'd been the same, he knew, when he'd first turned up here, a fifteen year old runaway, armed with a ten pack of fags and Peter. Good old Pete, he thought, as he wandered down the stairs, he'd always been there. _I'll have a cigarette,_ thought James, _then I'll wake him up early, just for a laugh. _The sun was rising above London, and all seemed well.

* * *

He'd almost forgotten about Lily, as he sat in the back room smoking, and the door clicked open. He'd been thinking about other things, like the weird green patch on the mattress where Sturgis slept, or how they should get Celia some flowers when she got out of hospital; girls liked that sort of thing, didn't they?. Thinking of Celia made James think of Bellatrix Lestrange, and Tom Riddle, and thinking of that at this time in the morning was never a good thing. They'd messed with his family, an unprovoked attack on a girl he would defend with his life, and they would pay. They'd have to pay. Actually, from what he could gather when the girls came home, they already had, but then again, that was McKinnon, and she was a mess.

The door clicked, and he jumped to his feet, ever the soldier.

"Who's there?" he called as quietly as he could, "Lestrange?"

There was a shuffling noise from the hall, and, clutching his cigarette tightly between his fingers, he advanced. If it _was _Lestrange, then he couldn't be held responsible for his actions.

It wasn't. It was Lily.

She stood in the hall with her jacket wrapped around her, and dirt on her face and tears streaming down her cheeks. She looked miserable, and small and it was at that moment James realized that she was sixteen years old, and a long way from home.

"Oh," she choked, "it's you."

"No need to sound so enthusiastic," he replied dryly, "_Jesus_, you look terrible."

"I don't see Jesus anywhere," she said thickly, "and thanks."

"No problem," he grinned in what he thought was a charming way (it wasn't; she thought he looked smarmy) "Cigarette?"

He offered her, stupidly, his own half smoked one, and she pulled a face.

But she was thinking, he could tell; her nose was scrunched up and her eyebrows furrowed together. Lily Suburbs, he thought to himself, was very obvious.

"Not yours," she said eventually, "I won't smoke yours."

"What?" he glanced at his hand, "Oh, right, yeah. No, you won't. The, urm," he nodded towards the back room, "rollies are through here."

"Right," she said, with a sad little sigh that made his grin drop a little.

"You alright?"

She shook her head, and he said nothing. He didn't really know what to say. What could you, to a girl who didn't want to talk about it? In an attempt to lighten the mood, he began to hum, and she shot him a look that was somewhere between disgust and pity. They wandered into the back room, side by side, and he threw her the roll ups wordlessly.

"They belong to Padfoot, technically," he told her as they sat on the stained mattress, and she rolled her cigarette in silence, "don't tell him."

"I won't," she promised. A pause, and then; "why'd you call him that?"

"What, Padfoot? Oh, well, it's a long sto-"

"They call you Prongs."

"Well observed, Miss Suburbs. D'you want a light?"

She looked confused for a moment, and then realized what she was holding. _Oh if my mother could see me now, _she thought dryly.

"Please."

He whipped out a box of matches, and lit it obligingly. "I've never seen you smoke before."

"I've never needed it, before."

"But this isn't your first fag, right? I mean, I don't want to be responsible for any smokers cough you get, I don't want that on my conscience,"

"Relax," she seemed to perk up a bit, and nudged his shoulder with her own, "I've smoked before."

"I don't believe you."

"Summer 1975. Back of my first boyfriend's car. It was disgusting, and I was nearly sick. Might've had something to do with the wine I drank with it, but it happened."

"Thought you said Surrey was boring as fuck?"

"It was," she sighed, and inhaled, "that boyfriend is now training to be an accountant, and I didn't have another one after that evening," she paused, and exhaled. "An accountant, though? I mean, really, at eighteen?"

"How long did you go out for?" he asked her, and she drew her knees up to her chin.

"I dunno, couple of months, more or less," she closed her eyes as she took a drag, and he saw then, how she really was, scared and sad and beautiful, "he was a shit kisser."

And she opened her eyes, and they giggled like children. Which, James Potter supposed, they were.


	7. Dog Days

**A/N: I don't own any of this.**

**WARNING THERE IS DRUG USE IN THIS CHAPTER JUST THOUGHT YOU SHOULD KNOW**

* * *

Dog Days

_Run fast for your mother and fast for your father_

_Run for your children_

_For your sisters and brothers_

After the phone box incident, life seemed to slip back into how it had been before. Lily spent most days in the back room, sunshine filtering through the grime on the windows. She read frequently, for the house seemed to have books spilling out of every nook and cranny. Marlene lent her _Les Miserables_ ("it'll take you about a gazillion years to read, Ginge," she warned her, "but you'll come to think of the characters as your mates, I promise.") and Dorcas gave her a copy of every music magazine published in the West London area (_and circled the articles she wrote so that Lily would read them first_) and Emmeline gave her Wilde, Plath, cummings, Keats and Vonnegut, and she tore through them like a woman possessed, devouring every word, every punctuation mark, every paragraph like reading was necessary for her to live. James watched her fondly, because for all her uncontrollable fire, they were the same, really.

Celia came home two weeks after the attack, and she was still shaken. September was fading fast, and the leaves crunched under the gang's feet as they walked her home.

"We got 'em though, Cee," Marlene told her, helping the tiny brunette up the steps, "didn't we, Dor?"

Dorcas said nothing, but her lips pursed in a way that was frighteningly similar to Petunia. Lily took her friend's arm good naturedly, but Dorcas did not smile.

"Eye for an eye," Celia said quietly, "and the whole world will be blind."

"Did you just quote Ghandi?" Alex asked incredulously, but Celia merely smiled.

"Oh bollocking shit," she said suddenly, "I'm not supposed to move my face, oh fuck that _hurts_." She groaned, but soldiered on, into the house and the messy hall, and the rest of them followed obediently.

"They should've kept her in." Lily muttered to Alex. The boy shrugged.

"I think she was going mad," he remarked, "stuck in there. Better for her to be out here, where we can look after her."

"_Nurses _were looking after her," Lily pointed out, "and doctors."

"We've got to look after our own, Ginge," Marlene's voice carried through the hall, "otherwise what's the point?"

The Marauders arrived home from whatever they did all day (Lily thought it had something to do with a record company…) at half past six, and they promised Celia a welcome home party she'd never forget.

"See the thing is, Cee," James told her, as they huddled around the telly watching _Blue Peter _("it's not just for kids!" Peter had said "It's educational!") "is that we've missed you. _Sure_, you're a midget with a penchant for bursting into song every two minutes, and _yes_, you're obsessed with the beardy one out of ABBA, which is ridiculous because you're living with a gang of _punks, _Mitchell, honestly-"

"He's really ho-" began Celia, but James raised a palm to silence her.

"But the fact of the matter is that you're _our _singing, ABBA obsessed midget."

"It's been quiet without you-" Sirius chipped in.

"Too quiet-" added Remus.

"It's really not been right at all." Peter finished.

Celia did not smile, because she couldn't, but she patted each of their hands affectionately.

"I am looking forward to this party _greatly,_ boys," she told them, "so don't mess up."

James gave her a salute, and Lily giggled at his mock sobriety.

"Something funny, Suburbs?" he asked her, and she giggled more.

"Nothing's funny, James," she replied, but the giggles kept popping from her mouth like bubbles, "nothing's funny at all."

He smirked at her, and for the first time he didn't look smarmy. He looked like what he was, a sixteen year old boy brimming with self-confidence and humour.

"So this party…" she asked, leaning forward with a wicked grin on her features, "how'd we get it started?"

And James looked at Sirius, who looked to Remus, who looked to Peter, and all four grinned smiles that lit up the grimy room.

"Glad you asked, Ginge," Sirius told her, "I'm glad you asked."

* * *

The heat had broken weeks before, but there was still something in the air, something that lay heavy, as the Marauders took Lily on their self-proclaimed Magical Mystery Tour.

"They split up," Lily told them as they wandered through Ladbroke Grove.

"Who did?" Sirius asked absentmindedly, "oh, right, The Beatles?"

"My mum cried." Peter remarked, and James laughed.

"Mine's still listening to bloody Fred Astaire." he said cheerily.

"Are you going to split up?" Lily asked them quietly, "The four of you? Like The Beatles?"

"Never!" declared James, throwing an arm around Peter's shoulders, "Not even death shall part the four of us!"

"I dunno," Sirius smirked, "If a bird good looking enough asked, I'd drop the three of you like hot cakes."

"Yeah, I second that," Remus chipped in, "How am I ever supposed to get married if I've got you lot hanging around me like a bad smell?"

"You won't be marrying anyone if you carry on being a self-pitying bas-" Peter began. He was silenced when James thumped him.

"Not in front of Lily!" the bespectacled boy hissed.

Lily took no notice, and walked ahead of them, hands thrown in the pockets of her jacket, watching the birds fly over the city.

"Pretty," she called back to them, "isn't it?"

"What, this place?" Sirius ran forward, and threw an arm around her shoulder, and she smiled. He wasn't awful; none of these boys were. They were just that; _boys_. "Nah, it's ugly as fuck, man. _You_'ve still got heart eyes about it, because _you _didn't grow up here, but I did, and let me tell you, Ginge, there is nothing _pretty _about stepping in a pile of sick before tripping over a pigeon, going sprawling into the road and nearly getting hit by a bus on your way to school. _Nothing_."

"Pooh!" Lily laughed, "I still say it's pretty. I mean, just _look _at it! Look at the way the birds fly over the buildings, the way the roofs of the houses aren't in a straight line, y'see, the skyline goes up and down, how different one street is to the next. How this city is full of life, and noises and oh, what's that Tempest quote again?"

"O, brave new world-" began James, but Lily waved her hands to stop him.

"No, no, the other one! The isle is full of wonder, that one. When I think of London," she shrugged Sirius' arm off her shoulder, and ran forward to watch the pigeons fly out of the road as a car approached them, "I think of that quote."

Sirius glanced over at James, the look on his face clearly implying that he thought she was mad. But James was watching Lily with a strange sort of awe on his face, like he'd never seen anything so fascinating in his entire life.

"Oi! Prongs!" Sirius clicked in his friend's line of vision, but did not receive a reaction.

"_Jesus_," Sirius sighed, "Wormtail, if I _ever_ look at a girl like that, shoot me. Don't ask questions, just put a bullet through my brain. It would be kinder."

"To who?" Remus asked, "You, or the girl?"

"Me, obviously," he yawned, "Why do I care what happens to her?"

"Well if you're looking at her the way that James is looking at Lily right now," Remus pointed out, "then you must really like her. And besides, I thought you'd drop us if a girl good looking enough asked you to?"

"Yeah, but even if she was _really, really _fit, if I ever look at a girl the way that Prongs is looking at Ginge," Sirius replied, "then I must have had a _really long _dry spell."

"You're disgusting."

"No, good sir. _Prongs _is disgusting."

"Why am I disgusting?"

Sirius let out a harsh bark of laughter. "Rejoined the land of the living then?"

"What are you wankers on about?"

"Sirius wants me to shoot him!" Peter piped up, but James waved him away.

"No, no, what were you saying about me being disgusting?"

"The way you look at Ginge," Sirius nodded over to where Lily was, wandering the street with her mouth open in awe, "it's disgusting, and also weird."

"I think it's sweet!" Peter said, and Sirius frowned at him.

"I'm not looking at Ginge in a weird way," James protested. Remus let out a snort that earned him some incredulous looks from his friend.

"Look Prongs," Sirius said, "you might not be aware of it, but you _are _looking at Ginge like you want to jump her- no, more than that, if you just wanted to jump her it would be fine, but you look…I dunno, you look like you want to hold her hand."

"Why is that gross?" Peter wanted to know, but Sirius ignored him.

"We're The Beatles and The Stones and The Kinks and all those _great _rock'n'roll bands rolled into one, and we can't have some shitty suburban second rate Yoko Ono coming here and fucking it all up."

James stared at Sirius for a moment, as if he was in shock. And then-

"You're fucking ridiculous, you are." And James Potter ran forward to meet Lily Evans by the zebra crossing.

"Alright?"

"Ah, you slow pokes have hurried along- wait, no, James, did you run to catch up with me?" she asked, head tilted like a curious child.

"Didn't want you to get lost," he mumbled, and she laughed (_it sounded like wind whistling through the trees_, he thought).

"Oh bless you," she replied, "I'll be fine, you know. Where is it we're going again, Hampstead Heath? I can get there on the train no bother."

"Um…" he wasn't quite sure what to tell her. They hadn't argued since that morning with the cigarettes, but he couldn't quite shake the feeling that he was treading water, like one wrong move would send him spiraling off into the deep end.

"Sirius told me we're going to get party food," she continued, as they crossed the road, "but why we have to go to Hampstead Heath for it, I don't know."

"We're not going to Hampstead Heath, Subs," he said finally, and she looked round, surprise (_and was that a tiny bit of distrust in her eyes too?_) on her heart shaped face.

"Where are we going then?"

"Camden. To see Gid Prewett's girlfriend. She's…she's, uh, she's got some stuff for us. For the party."

"What kind of stuff?"

"Party stuff."

_Leave it Evans, _the voice in her head that sounded like Petunia told her, _don't rock the boat_. But she couldn't help feeling slightly uneasy about the whole thing, about James' voice and the way his hand went to his hair like it always did when he was nervous.

"James?" she said suddenly.

"_Si_?" the dark haired boy replied.

"I take it back."

"Take what back?"

"About you being an awful person who only cares about himself. I take it back. I don't hate you."

"I'm honoured," he replied dryly, "what changed your mind?"

"Your face," she told him, "when you saw I was sad that morning- I don't suppose you remember, it was weeks ago now- but that morning we smoked in the back room together? And the fact you're willing to go to such lengths for Celia. I don't hate you."

"Like I said, Subs," he said gruffly (_but his heart kept smacking against his ribcage_) "I'm honoured. So. Mates?"

"Yeah. We're mates."

* * *

Hestia Jones lived in a squat not too dissimilar to the one that Lily was currently living in. It was in a road of terraced houses, where some were unkempt, and others belonged to bankers. The front door had no lock, and anyone could wander in or out. The hallway was thin and messy, and there were patches on the walls where mirrors or pictures had been. The house was dimly lit, with candles on the windowsills. The kitchen was cramped and messy, and that's where they found Hestia and Gideon, making tea in a battered old kettle.

"We haven't got any tea bags, babe," Hestia was saying, "You'll have to use those shitty leaves that Sybs got in the hippy shop in Stoke Newington."

"She still claiming she can read them?" James asked from the doorway. Hestia glanced around, and let out a squeal of delight.

"Potter! You finally showed your ugly face!" she ran forward, and threw herself into James' arms, "oh, and you brought your boys, too!"

Sirius smirked charmingly. "Jones," he said, "a pleasure, as always." And he kissed her hand like he was in a fairytale.

"Oh you idiot boy," she laughed, "oh, I've missed you all! Remus!" She flung her arms around Remus' skinny shoulders, and then Peter's round ones. "And, oh, who is this?"

She had very brown eyes and very pink cheeks, and her dark hair was cut in a sharp bob. She looked at Lily inquisitively, but Lily was not scared. She couldn't be, not when this girl seemed to be so full of joy and affection.

"This is Lily, Hes," James explained, "she arrived about a month ago."

"Well, Lily, if you've gained the Marauders seal of approval," she beamed at Lily, who smiled back, "then you've got mine too. Welcome to the family." And she enveloped Lily in a bone crushing hug.

"Gid put the tea on, my love," Hestia called over when she let Lily go, "and I think Kingsley bought some biscuits with the Giro money last week, I'll have a look in the cupboards…"

She was a small woman, in her early twenties, and her round face was alight with joy as she bustled around the kitchen, humming softly. There were some people, Lily thought, that were born to look after others. Hestia Jones seemed to be one of them.

"Take a seat, you lot," she said, "No, not you, Gid, you help me with the tea. Lily, do you have milk in yours?"

"Oh, I don't mind. If you've got it then yes," Lily smiled.

"Well you're in luck, my love, because," she retrieved a bottle of milk from a door less cupboard, "we got some in this morning! Strong or weak?"

"Lily likes her tea like she likes her men," Sirius stretched, and his legs seemed to go on for miles, "pale and weak."

"Shut up, Sirius," the redhead laughed, "but yeah, Hestia, I like my tea weak, thanks."

"No problem!" Hestia replied chirpily, "Gid, babe, take Lily's mug to her, please."

"Right you are, princess," Gideon said, equally as cheerful. Hestia swatted him with a dishcloth.

"Excuse me, I am no princess. I am a _queen_."

"That you are, Hes," James said, "that you are."

Hestia drank tea like she was dying of thirst, and she spoke quickly and rhythmically, like a Fitzgerald novel.

"I've known James since I was knee height, you know," she told Lily, "he was an ugly little kid- still not a greater looker now, are you darling?"

"I don't think James is ugly…" Lily began to say, but Hestia laughed her off.

"Oh no, I don't _really _think that James is ugly- you're certainly not Sirius, dear, but you could be worse."

"Thanks Hestia," James replied grimly, sipping his tea.

"Oh hush, boy, you don't mind. Besides, none of you are as good looking as my Gideon," she patted Gid's hand, like they were an old married couple in their eighties, instead of two twenty somethings that were living, as Lily's mother would say, in sin.

"Cheers, babe," Gideon chuckled, "Biscuit?"

"Only if there's one for everyone," Hestia replied diplomatically. There were. A whole unopened pack of digestives in the only cupboard with a working door. Gideon doled them out, grinning like a small boy.

"No plates I'm afraid, darlings," Hestia announced, "Sybs broke the last one last weekend."

"How is ol' Sybs?" Peter asked, and there was a cruel tone of mocking in his voice. Hestia, however, didn't seem to notice it.

"Oh, she's fine, she's working right now. Well. I say working. She's mugging some posh hippies by claiming to be magic, but whatever helps her sleep at night, you know? She's upstairs actually, doing a-" she dropped her voice, so it sounded dark and dangerous, "_séance_ right now. Drop in on her if you want Pete, she wouldn't mind, she thinks you're cute."

Peter seemed to perk up a little bit. Sirius laughed.

"Does she?" squeaked the chubby boy. Sirius laughed harder.

"Mmm, yes, but a little too young for her. I think the exact quote was 'wait 'til he can buy me a sherry legally, then we'll talk'. Wasn't it Gid?"

Gideon made a noncommittal murmur, which Hestia ignored.

"So how're things chez Dumbledore?" she asked, "All's well?"

"Yeah," James replied, nibbling on his biscuit, "there was all that shit with Cee-"

"Oh gosh, yeah, Gid told me. Sounds awful, she alright?"

"Yeah, yeah, she's fine now-"

"She can't smile," Lily pointed out quietly. James gave her a look, a look that said _don't make her worried_, which confused Lily because Hestia didn't seem the type of woman to get bogged down by worries. She seemed light and airy. Like a fairy cake.

"Yeah, but that'll heal with the scar, won't it?" Sirius continued, "Point is, she's out of hospital."

"So we were thinking-" James said.

"Hoping, really-" Remus chipped in.

"That you'd help us throw a welcome home party," finished Peter, "The whole house is invited."

Hestia's round face lit up with joy. She nodded with an admirable eagerness, and affection for the people in her kitchen (_for it did seem to be her kitchen _thought Lily, _she could not imagine anyone else as in control around broke cupboards and damp ceilings as Hestia was_) as she hugged them all.

"Oh darlings, I would love to! Absolutely love to!"

James cleared his throat. "There was, ahem, _one specific thing _we were hoping you'd help us out with."

Her grin dimmed. "I see," she said shortly. "Right. Well. What time…?"

"Nine-ish." Remus told her. She nodded.

"I'll see you then," she promised. There was a small sadness in her eyes that the boys didn't seem to notice, as they carried on eating their biscuits and gulping their tea.

"Y'know, Hes," James talked with his mouthful, "if it wasn't for you, I think we'd have gone mad a long time ago."

"No, you wouldn't," she mumbled, "You'd find some other idiot, and milk her dry."

The Marauders did not hear her, but Gideon did. And he squeezed her hand with such tenderness that it made Lily a little uncomfortable watching them, because she felt she was watching something so private and personal that she was being rude.

"Invite Sybs along," Peter told her, "it'll be a laugh."

Some of the old light returned to Hestia's face. "Oh _ho ho_ there, rat boy," she chuckled, "wait 'til you're legal, yeah? Sybs isn't cut out for a life in prison."

Peter blushed bright red, and the other boys cackled with laughter.

"Who's Sybs?" Lily nudged James, who turned to her with the widest grin on his face. It blinded her.

"Oh, right, yeah, sorry Subs," James nudged her back, "Sybs is…well…she's hard to explain, isn't she?"

"She's several sandwiches short of a picnic," Remus said, "to put it kindly."

"Off her trolley bonkers more like," Sirius grinned, "she's a _medium_." His voice was practically dripping with disdain.

"Don't be so rude, Black," Hestia swatted him with her tea towel, but Sirius merely laughed, biscuit crumbs flying from his mouth.

Hestia wrinkled her nose. "See, this is why I don't live with you anymore. You're disgusting."

"You love me." And he winked at her.

For a moment, there seemed to be nothing else in the world to Lily, there was just dry Digestive biscuits and cold mugs of tea, and the sound of laughter rattling the window panes.

"She liked you." James told her as they boarded the Tube back to Ladbroke Grove.

"I liked _her_." Lily replied carelessly, "She seemed kind. I like kind people."

"Is that why you like me so much?" he teased. Lily laughed.

"You think you're funny."

"I _know _I'm funny."

She did not reply, instead choosing to look out the window, a strange kind of wistfulness in her bright green eyes. She was thinking about Gideon squeezing Hestia's hand, and how widely she'd smiled when she'd seen the boys at the door. Lily hoped that she could be like that when she was older, a light in a dingy kitchen.

"You looking forward to the party, Ginge?" Sirius asked her, swinging on a pole in what he thought was charming and enigmatic way, but actually just made look a bit of a tit.

"Like I look forward to getting a tooth removed." she responded, but with a grin that betrayed her real feelings. She couldn't remember the last time she'd been to a proper, real _party_, one that didn't heavily feature Viennetta and sherry. There was going to be music from _this _decade played there, thank God, rather than her mother's battered copy of _The Best of Cliff Richard_. Ugh, Cliff Richard. A Butlins Elvis if ever she'd seen one.

"Your sarcasm wounds me," Sirius replied dryly, "honestly Ginge, I am _hurt_."

"Oh, piss off," she laughed.

"Lily, you are cruel," he mocked. It was, she thought, the first time he had called her by her first name.

"So what's the deal with Hestia and Gid, then? Did she live with you lot?" Lily asked.

James seemed to think for a moment, eyebrows furrowed together, like he was considering what was appropriate to tell her.

"Yeah," he said eventually, "yeah, she lived with us for…I dunno, Padfoot, how long was Hes at ours?"

"She arrived before I did – Moony, can I scrounge a fag? Thanks." Cigarette between his teeth, he continued, "yeah, she and Gid were living together when they were really young, fourteen or something."

_So I was right, _she thought, _they are an old married couple. _"And their parents didn't mind?"

"Do _your _parents mind you being here?" James asked, one eyebrow raised quizzically.

Oh God, her parents. Her poor parents. They hadn't done anything _wrong, _had they? They'd just done as their parents had done, and they had done as their parents had done, and so on and so forth until the beginning of time. But that wasn't what Lily wanted. And that's why she was here, wasn't it? To stop the cycle before it consumed her. But, oh, she did love them, and she did miss them, and there was an ache in her chest when she thought of them.

"No," she replied quietly, "no, they don't. Do yours?"

James snorted. "Do I look like the kind of bloke who cares what his parents think?"

She cocked her head to one side, regarding him. James Potter cared, that much she knew. He cared about his Marauders, about the people he lived with (and even the people who he didn't live with) and he thought he was funny.

"Yes," she said softly, "you do."

He laughed coldly, and lit a cigarette.

* * *

Whilst they were gone, Alex had taken some money out of the jar that sat on the mantelpiece above the fireplace in the living room, and gone to the shops. He'd also gone to the phone box where Lily had spent an hour crying in, and called every person he could think of off the top of his head who would be up for a party.

And when the others returned home, the kitchen was bustling, and there were people who Lily had not ever met before smoking in the hallway.

"Blimey," Remus let out a low whistle, "I didn't realize word had got out so quickly."

"It's nice!" Peter said enthusiastically, "It's nice to see everyone again!"

"Yeah, but let's not go around slitting people's faces open just to have a get together," Sirius stubbed out his cigarette on the wall, and left a pile of ash on the floor, "Excuse me, I see an old friend. James?"

James pushed past Lily, and he and Sirius disappeared off into the kitchen.

"We won't see them for the rest of this evening," Remus muttered into Lily's ear, "not when there's pretty girls to chat up."

"What about you?" Lily teased, "Have you not got a gang of groupies waiting here for you?"

Remus said nothing, but his face blanched and his jaw tightened. Lily thought she must have hit a nerve, although she could not think why, and so looked around desperately to find something else to talk about.

"Aren't you going to introduce me to any of your friends?" she asked, in what she hoped was a sweet way. Remus looked across to her (for they were the same height, there or thereabouts) and smiled a sad, forced smile.

"Of course, yeah," he said, "sorry. Pete?"

"Frank!" Peter called over to a man stood by the stairs, drink in hand, "Frank, hi!"

The man, who seemed to be in his mid twenties, with messy dark hair and stubble, bumbled (_that really is the only word for it, dear reader_) over, accompanied by a pretty woman with a round face and curly blonde hair. She was, Lily noticed, heavily pregnant.

"Hello dears!" she exclaimed, clasping Remus and Peter's hands with her own chubby ones, "How are you?"

"We're alright, Al, thanks for asking- this is Lily," Remus gestured towards the aforementioned Lily, and Al beamed at her.

"Hello lovely," she said, "I'm Alice! This is Frank-" Frank gave Lily a nod of recognition, "- I hope the boys are treating you all right?"

"They're perfect gentlemen," Lily smiled- she couldn't _not, _because Alice's smile was so infectious.

"Well if they start giving you hassle, you come and tell me, and I'll sort them out for you, darling."

"Thanks, Alice."

"Us girls have got to stick together," and she winked, "Drink?"

"You don't live here anymore, Al," Remus said, "you don't have to play hostess anymore."

"On the subject of hostesses," Peter piped up, "Hestia's coming at nine!"

"Oh how lovely!" Alice cried, "Oh, won't that be fantastic, Frank? All the gang together again- Gid's coming with her, right?"

"Yeah, the whole gang'll be here," James had appeared from the kitchen, cocky smirk on his skinny face.

"James!" Alice grabbed his hand and squeezed it tightly, "Hello, dear!"

"Alright, Al? Blimey, haven't you got fat?"

She laughed loudly, and let go of his hand. "Cheeky bugger! I'm not fat, darling, I'm having a baby!"

"I would never have guessed," James smirked, "You got drinks?"

"Alex sorted us out when we arrived, but these three haven't!"

"You're clogging the doorway," James said shortly to Lily, "Come into the kitchen."

Lily looked at Remus, because the harshness in James' voice caused her skin to prickle uncomfortably, and Remus was kind, and would tell her why the wind had changed, but he said nothing, did nothing. It had gone unnoticed by Peter too, who was avidly discussing the most recent Arsenal game with Frank. Alice only sucked her teeth and raised her eyebrows.

"Who put a bee in your knickers?" Lily asked as they made their way through the hall.

"No one," he replied, tone still sharp and short, "why d'you always talk such rubbish, Subs?"

"You're the one getting in a stress for _no reason at all_."

"_Jesus, _Subs," he turned to her, and they stood in the doorway to the kitchen together. There was smoke and laughter billowing from it, but Lily couldn't care less. James was doing the _thing _again, where he made the hair on her arms stand on end. "I'm not getting in a stress for _no_-"

"Ha! So you admit you're getting in a stress?"

He mumbled something that sounded like 'for fuck's sake', and Lily smirked triumphantly.

"Ha!" she said again.

"Oh, bugger off, will you?" James snapped, but he didn't mean it. He couldn't, she thought, because he was laughing a little, and his smile reached his sparkling hazel eyes. Lily giggled.

"Drinks?" she said. He nodded.

The band had set up camp in the back room, and played continuously until the sun rose. Celia had been crowned queen by Alex; she wore one of those paper crowns that Lily had previously only seen at Christmas, and sat in the comfiest armchair in the back room, and was hugged by everyone in the house at least twice.

There was no alcohol that night, which surprised Lily, but there seemed to be pop on tap, and she could not remember a time during the night when there was no dancing in the back room. Hestia arrived at nine o'clock, and brought with her Gideon, and enough speed to kill a horse.

"Blimey, Hes," James exclaimed when he saw the bags laid on the table, "you sure you can spare all this?"

"Yes," she replied firmly, "I'm trying to clean up my act, James, and how am I supposed to do that when I've got all this lying around the house?"

Lily, who was stood in the doorway of the kitchen, smoking, was not surprised. She knew, of course, that the house was not squeaky clean, that it was a place of hedonism from time to time. She expected it, almost. This was rock'n'roll, after all.

"You wanna get in there quick," Marlene called from where she sat by the cupboard, drink in hand, "it'll all go soon."

"Aren't you…?"

"Nah, I don't bother with all that shit. Got my booze," she gestured to the glass, "got my fags. I don't need chemicals to have a good time." And then she knocked the clear liquid back without flinching.

Lily was silent for a moment. "What will it do to me? The drugs?"

Marlene did not reply until she had poured herself another glass of vodka. "It won't kill you, Ginge."

"I trust your judgement," was all the red head said in return.

It didn't kill her. It made everything brighter, somehow, and her heart race, and she found that she could dance faster, laugh louder, and think faster than before. Everything went blurry at points, and Lily could hear her heart beat in her ears. There were limbs everywhere, and sweat too, and her voice seemed louder too, not that anyone was listening to what she was saying. Everything was heightened, and it seemed strange to Lily that she had not experienced this before, that she had gone her whole life without really _seeing _things.

* * *

The doorbell rang at ten past nine the next morning, and that changed everything. Lily was sleeping in the back room, curled up on the stained mattress, a coat thrown over her shivering shoulders. Her head was muggy and thick, and she could not remember most of the previous night's events.

"WILL SOMEONE OPEN THE DOOR PLEASE?" Marlene yelled from upstairs, "I'M IN MY KNICKERS!"

Lily groaned, and opened her eyes slowly, because they were heavy and full of dust. She was not alone in the back room; on the sofa lay Fabian Prewett, and Dorcas lay on the floor beside him, wrapped in the blanket that was normally on her bed. Celia was no longer in her armchair, and the instruments the band had been playing lay abandoned by the bookshelves.

The doorbell rang again. "COME ON YOU SHIT HEADS, GET THE FUCK UP!" Marlene roared again. There was a shuffling noise from the kitchen, and Lily felt that it was safe to close her eyes again. Oh God, she ached all over. Was this a come down? It must be. She'd seen documentaries about drugs on the BBC, and her mum had made her and Petunia swear they wouldn't touch them. But then, she'd sworn she'd never run away either, and look what happened there. Oh, her poor mother. She could almost hear her in her head, asking where she was, her voice straining with the stress of being mother to this awful- wait? She wasn't imagining it, she could hear it, she could hear her mother in the hall! She must be imagining things, surely? Slowly, because every muscle in her body was still asleep, she sat up, and rubbed the dust out of her eyes.

It was her mother. "Where's Lily?" she was asking, "Have you kidnapped my daughter?"

James was stood in the hall, in a vest and pants (_oh God, how embarrassing_) and he still had one hand on the front door. And he was trying to close it.

"Look," James said, "I don't know anyone called Lily Evans. Keep the noise down, alright, there are people trying to sleep here."

It was like a part of Lily's brain was asleep, and she could not take in what was going on. James didn't know her last name, true, but he knew her first name. Why was he trying to send her mum away?

"No, you don't understand!" Mrs. Evans was on the verge of tears, "She telephoned us from a phonebox! My husband is a policeman, he traced the call! She's here, she's here! She wants to see me!"

_Oh bloody hell, _Lily thought, _I'd forgotten that calls were traceable. _

But her mum was right. She did want to see her. She wanted to be told that it was okay, that she didn't have to live in Surrey, not if she didn't want to. And that she didn't have to stay here forever either, because lately the drowning feeling had been all too frequent. She had to talk to her mum.

But her mind was moving too slowly for what was happening, and all at once, the door slammed shut, and James' voice bellowed "AND DON'T COME BACK!"

There was a grumble from the floor, and Dorcas pulled the blanket further over her head. Fabian slept soundly, oblivious. _I must be dreaming_, Lily thought, _I am dreaming, and if I go back to sleep, I will wake up and this won't happen. James won't turn my mother away, and everything will be alright. _And so she closed her eyes. But of course, nothing changed.

* * *

"So, Ginge," Sirius asked her as they ate lunch (although it was half past three in the afternoon, so it can't _really _be classed as lunch) "how did you find it?"

"Find what? Pass us the bread, Cee? Thanks."

"The party. Your first one. Your cherry has been popped, as it were."

Lily laughed. "Don't flatter yourself, Sirius, my cherry had been popped _long _before you came on the scene."

There was silence for a moment, save for the noise of James choking on the cloudy lemonade left over from the night before. A giggle escaped Dorcas' lips, and Peter smacked James on the back, hard, to stop his splutters.

"Sorry," he coughed, "very sorry. But _Jesus, _Subs, don't drop bombshells like that whilst we're eating."

"Or drinking, in your case." Remus pointed out. Lily cackled.

"Oh really, James, clear your mind up," she snorted, "I wasn't talking about _that _kind of cherry."

"It wasn't just me that thought you were talking about that!" he protested, "Dorcas thought it too!"

"Did not!" the brunette exclaimed, and Marlene cackled manically.

"You _so _did, Dor," James told her, and Marlene laughed louder.

"Lily, tell him! Tell him I wasn't thinking of that!" Dorcas shoved James playfully, and he snorted with laughter.

"I'm sure you weren't, Dorcas," Lily soothed her.

"D'you know who popped their cherry?" Celia said with a wicked grin in her eye.

"Who?" Sirius wanted to know, "Who got laid last night, apart from me and McKinnon?"

"I really needed to know that, thanks." Dorcas deadpanned, as Celia giggled. Alex shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

"Oh my God…" Marlene said, "Alex got laid!"

He nodded, and Marlene gave a whoop.

"We're _eating_." Remus pointed out, but no one listened to him.

"He made me sleep in the hall so him and Ben could, _ahem_," Celia cleared her throat, "_get to know each other better_."

"See, I feel like this is how I should introduce you to the new kids," James said, "this is Alex. He likes acting, cider, and dick."

There was more laughter from the group; Celia was chuckling into her cheese sandwich, and Alex tittered into his bottle of cider ('hair of the dog' he'd told Lily) and for a moment, the tiniest of moments, everything seemed to be okay, because all there was in the world was laughter, and mugs of flat lemonade. And then Marlene went and ruined it all.

"So who was that at the door earlier?" she asked carelessly.

"Oh, some mad old cow accusing me of abducting her daughter," James replied, equally as carelessly. Lily's heart dropped into her stomach. It had not been a dream.

"Why did she think that?" Dorcas was saying, but Lily's head was spinning and she could not hear what was being said clearly.

"Someone traced a call to the nearest phone box I think? Alex, you gonna finish that?" Alex was not going to finish it, and so James helped himself to the last slice of treacle tart.

"How d'you go from a phone box," Marlene said (_Lily thought she was drowning_) "to here? Unless she was asking about?"

"Yeah, but there's about a thousand places round here that her daughter could be," Celia pointed out, "half of London's made up of restless teenagers."

Lily couldn't feel her fingers. Her head was pounding, and it wasn't the come down. It was the fact that she was so _close _to feeling her mother's bony arms wrapped around her shoulders, being told that it was alright, that everything was going to fine. Comfort had slipped through her fingers like water, and now she couldn't get it back. There was no way her mother was going to come back, not after the way James had spoken to her. And she _couldn't _go back to Surrey, she just couldn't.

"You alright, Lily?" Alex nudged her, "You look a bit green."

"That was my mum," she replied dully, "at the door, earlier. I thought I'd dreamt it, but I hadn't. My mum's looking for me," she looked into James' hazel eyes, and saw that his eyebrows were furrowed in confusion, but the words kept slipping out of her mouth without her really realizing, "and you sent her away. You sent my mum away."

James opened his mouth and closed it again, once, twice. He looked like he was in shock; whether it was from what she'd said or the way she said it, she didn't, and would never, know. But his face was blank and his eyes were wide, and no one said anything for an awfully long time.

Until Dorcas cleared her throat.

"There might still be time, Lily," she said quietly, "you know, there might still be time to see her…"

"I don't see why you would," Marlene cut in harshly, "you ran away, remember? Why the fuck would you want to go back there?"

Lily said nothing, because she could hear her heartbeat in her ears and she felt sick to the bottom of her stomach.

"'Scuse me," she muttered, and she fled the kitchen, the hallway, to the front of the house, where she heaved up the contents of her stomach on the grey pavement.

There was nothing outside the house to hold onto, so she fell backwards onto the cold, hard stone steps, and sobbed into her thin and shaking hands.

"Lily?" a gentle Welsh voice came from behind her, "Lily, are you alright, pet?"

She shook her head violently, which only churned her stomach more. Bronwyn sighed, and sat beside her.

"You know," she told Lily after a long silence, "someone's going to have to clean all that up." She gestured to the pile of vomit, and Lily cringed. _What a mess you are, Evans_.

"I'm guessing last night was your first time doing any kind of speed, right?"

She nodded slowly, and the pounding in her head lessened. "My mum came to the house earlier," she said thickly through her fast flowing tears, "and James sent her away. My fucking _mum_, Bronwyn."

Bronwyn was silent for a moment. She had not, in truth, spent much time with the young redhead, but her kind heart ached for this scared, small girl who was so very far away from home.

"Did he know?" she asked softly, "Did he know that it was your mum? Because people do things in ignorance that they wouldn't do in knowledge, Lily."

"You sound like Dumbledore," Lily sniffed, "and she was asking for me. She was asking for Lily, and he didn't think to come and get me, he told her to leave. And to never come back, and now I've lost her…" she let out a howl like a dying animal, and Bronwyn put an arm around her bony shoulders.

"Nothing is ever properly lost, pet," she soothed, "things always come back to us somehow."

"Not this," Lily replied, "I can't go back to Surrey, Bronwyn, I can't do it. If I do, I'll…"

"Feels like drowning, doesn't it?" she said, "Knowing that your whole life has been planned out for you and you can't do a single bloody thing about it. So you came here. And the feeling doesn't change, the drowning feeling, it just lessens. And sometimes it gets so overwhelming that you think you might die from it. Am I along the right lines?"

Lily nodded again, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

"I was like you," Bronwyn continued, "I had wanderlust too. So I understand, Lily, I understand why you can't go back there. But don't blame James, pet, for the fact you can't go back."

Lily looked at Bronwyn. She was pretty, in her mid-twenties, with a tanned and freckled face, big brown eyes and tight, curly brown hair. She looked kind, which, Lily supposed, she was.

"Thank you, Bron," she said, "and if there's anything I can ever do for you…"

"Don't worry about it, pet," Bronwyn smiled, and stood up, "but, if you're offering…"

"I'll clean up the pavement, Bron." she promised. The older girl disappeared back into her café, and Lily was left alone.

* * *

Of course, she was not alone for long. When one was living with more people than you can count on two hands, solitude was a rarity.

"Bron said you were out here…" James said quietly. Lily, still sat on her step, did not look around. She couldn't look at him.

"I didn't know, Subs- Evans- Lily, I didn't know, I swear."

She did not turn round, and so he sat beside her. "I am sorry, you know."

"I'm sure you are," she said coldly, "I'm sure you are."

"Lily, you're not- I mean, I know you're upset, but it's just the come down. It's not-"

"_Don't_," she hissed, snapping around to look at him, "don't you _dare _try and blame this on the drugs. Don't tell me my feelings aren't _real _because I took a stupid pill. Just _don't_."

He scoffed. "You didn't tell me that you wanted to see her, Subs. You talked constantly of how _boring _your old life was, you didn't make it sound like you wanted to see your family."

"She asked for Lily!" the aforementioned Lily spat, "She said she wanted to see me, why didn't you _get me_? Why didn't you think 'oh, do you know what, there's a Lily fast asleep on that mattress in the back room, this might be her mum and _she might want to speak to her_?"

"Because if it was my mum, I wouldn't want anyone letting her in, alright?" he snapped back, running a hand through his hair.

"You seem to be under the impression that we're the same person," Lily sneered at him, "and I have absolutely no idea where you've got that from. And because of you, I might've lost my family for good."

"No," he said, voice low and quiet, "you did that yourself when you did a runner."

She said nothing in reply, and he went back into the house in silence. The enormity of what she'd done hit her like a ton of bricks, and all that could be heard down that dusty street was her choked sobs.


	8. Wonderwall

**author's note: thank you for your reviews! there is a little bit of violence in this chapter, just a heads up!**

**disclaimer: things i own: not this.**

* * *

Wonderwall

_Today is gonna be the day  
That they're gonna throw it back to you  
By now you should've somehow  
Realized what you gotta do  
I don't believe that anybody  
Feels the way I do, about you now_

* * *

It seemed to Lily that nothing ever changed in the house. They existed almost in a bubble, where nothing got in and nothing got out. They knew of things that were happening in the world, of course, because the radio played constantly, and Celia and Peter watched _Blue Peter _every evening, but it was like none of those things were _actually happening_. They were in another world, to people who ate frequently, and didn't have damp in the corner of the kitchen ceiling.

In the third week of October, she was, for the first time, alone in the house. The Marauders had gone to work, and Dorcas had a meeting with the editor of _Sounds_. Marlene had gone with the band to listen to the final mix of their demo, and Celia and Alex had gone on a job hunt. Bronwyn and Caradoc had returned to Cardiff for a week, and all was quiet.

A day all to herself, she thought. _Blimey_.

Still in her pjamas at half past twelve, she sat watching the news with a bowl of cereals (_without milk, because they couldn't afford it_) and a ten pack of cigarettes. The things on the telly seemed so distant; she could not concentrate on droughts, or taxes, or Education Ministers, because it was very far away from where she was. She thought about her mum, and what Petunia was doing, and how Mary was getting on at college. She wondered if she could still get a decent job, after she'd got all this out of her system (_because she wasn't going to live here forever, one day the empty feeling in her chest would fade_) without having gone to college. She thought she would. She had decent O Levels, didn't she? And she was a hard worker, she got on well with people, she was-

The front door clicked, and she froze, spoon mid-way to her mouth, cigarette smoldering in the ashtray. Who was it? Was it Dumbledore? It could be, it could be Dumbledore checking up on her, checking up on the revolution (_a revolution that was being put off in favour of doing speed at three o'clock in the morning, and watching Blue Peter in your pjamas_), she was sure it was Dumbledore. The person in the hall cleared their throat, and she realized it was not Dumbledore.

"Hullo?" called the person in the hall, "anyone in?"

She remained silent. She didn't want to talk to him. They hadn't said more than three words to each other since he'd sent her mum away, and if she was being honest, she didn't _know _what to say to him. She didn't want to apologize for what she'd said, because she wasn't sorry, she meant every word of it. It _was _his fault.

"I know there's someone here!" he called again, shuffling around in the hall, "I can see the telly!"

She said nothing, and continued eating her cereals.

And then, he was in the doorway, and there was nowhere for her to hide.

"Subs," he said quietly, "it's you."

"'lo, James." she replied. Oh, she had _so_ wanted to be his friend. And maybe she was, maybe she had been. But not anymore.

"They sent me back," he mumbled, "to get a, urm, to get some of Sirius' records, they're, um…" and he gestured to the mountain of LPs by the TV, and she shrugged.

"Go ahead." She paused. She might not be sorry, but she _did_ still want to be his mate

Being friends with James seemed to make people the best they could possibly be. He was brilliant, but he wanted- no, he _knew_, that you could be brilliant too, and so they were. He believed in them, and as a result they believed in themselves. She'd seen it in Peter's smile, in Remus' jokes and Dorcas' cackle. And she wanted to be a part of that.

"James," she said, as he made his way to the records, "what _is _it that you do all day?"

He laughed. "I work at Sturgis Podmore's record company," he replied, running a hand through his hair, "and I've worked there since I've lived here. I used to be a tea boy, but now-" he knelt by the box, blocking her view of the telly. She didn't mind too much; the news was so_ miserable_- "I basically spend all day listening to demo tapes and the like, and telling Sturgis which ones I think they should sign. It's a laugh- me and Padfoot do it, and Remus knocks about with Peter in the production bit. They're both into all that, the proper science-y bit of record making, and it's nice, y'know, spending all day with your mates. And," he said triumphantly, "we get paid for it."

"If you weren't doing that," Lily asked, shuffling on the sofa, "what _would _you be doing?"

He bit his lip, like he wasn't sure how to answer. "I'm- I don't- Thing is, right, Lily, is that we- the boys and me- it's complicated, why we're here. Why we've been here for years."

Lily looked at him, really and properly looked at him. He was sixteen. He looked it, too, she thought, his face pale and slightly spotty, his body thin and scrawny. His hair was a mess, and his glasses were dusty, and slightly uneven. He was a child, and so was she.

"I'm listening," was all she said.

"They're expecting me back at the-"

"They won't mind," she continued, clearing a space next to her on the sofa, "not if you explain to them."

"I thought you hated me?" he asked, voice small and hand in hair.

"Nah," she said, "I don't." Because she didn't.

And so he sat beside her, records resting on his knees.

"Pete and me went to primary school together," he began, "in Wiltshire. Godric's Hollow, that's where we grew up. Sirius is London born and bred, Islington way. And Remus is…Remus was born in Wales, near Swansea, I think. So Pete and me- Pete and I, we were mates from the start. He was this little chubby thing, and our school was tiny, and we just got sort of thrown together. His heart is in the right place, and he makes me laugh, so I kept him around. And, well- y'see, thing is, that my family pretty much owned the whole village. There's no nice way of saying it, my parents are filthy rich." He paused, and glanced at her. Lily nodded slowly, to show him it was alright, that she was still listening.

"And they wanted this life for me that I… I mean, I love them. They're old, and I've not- I don't speak to them, because of what I'm about to tell you about, but I love, and loved them. But we wanted different things. Like you, I suppose. So they've got this life plan, which involves, basically, me getting married at twenty, becoming a lawyer, eventually taking over the estate. And all- and this is going to sound stupid and selfish- but all I wanted to do aged fourteen was play football."

He looked at her again, and she smiled in what she hoped was a comforting way. She got it, she understood it. He had the drowning feeling too.

"And I was good, I really was, I could've gone far. But they wouldn't let me, they wouldn't let me go to trials or anything like that. So, my fifteenth birthday comes along, and I'm at this school learning about things I don't care about, and my parents are talking about universities and which local girl I'm going to marry, and the only thing I've got is Pete. I mean, I was popular, but he was the only one who liked me for _me_, y'know? So we get this plan together- we're going to go to London, and I'm going to try out for the teams- which ones I don't care about, all I want to do is play football, and Pete's got a lot of problems with his mum, ones that it's not my place to talk about, and he wanted out, and so did I, so we did. September two years ago, we hitched a lift with Steve Spencer's brother into Swindon, and we got a train and we ended up in North London. Which is where Sirius comes in."

"I see…" Lily replied quietly. She wanted to take his hand (she could feel how hard it was for him, talking about all this. She wondered whether he'd ever spoken of it before.) but it didn't seem appropriate.

"He was…he was a mess. Fifteen years old, and going out every night and getting smashed, doing all sorts of drugs, sleeping with all sorts of people. We met in a pub, and he got into a fight, and ended up sleeping on the floor of our squat because he couldn't face going home. We were, at that point, living alone, just the two of us. He'd been kicked out of school because he'd been caught with the headmaster's daughter in a- _ahem_- compromising position, and he hated his parents. They're proper old money, richer than mine, and they were grooming him to take over all the businesses and I think he cracked. He left them a few weeks after we met, just announced that he was living with us full time. I thought, and still think, that he's brilliant. Sometimes he can be a bit of a dick, but can't we all? But he's loyal, through and through, and he's funny as fuck, and sometimes I think that in a former life we were brothers. He knows me. And I'd go as far to say that he saved us, because we didn't know what we were doing. I wasn't getting anywhere with the clubs, and we were squatting in this hell hole of a flat…and he just came in and told us what to do, and he saved us. So there we were, three fifteen year olds with no parents, very little money, and no clue what to do next. And…then I got injured."

His voice cracked slightly, and Lily knew then that it was alright to hold his hand. So she did. He didn't protest, but squeezed it tightly, and they rested their joined hands in the space between them.

"I got into a brawl in a nightclub…" he explained, "Sirius knew the doorman, that's how we got in, and some tosser started on Peter, and I…" he cleared his throat, "I got thrown over the bar, smashed into all the bottles, and I did my knee in. And in the hospital, that's where we met Remus. He's…well he was in the hospital, let's just say that, and whilst I was recovering, I got to know him, and I liked him- he's funny, and kind, and I admire that in people- and he wanted to get out of the hospital, just like we wanted to get out of Wiltshire, out of our parents' house."

She did not ask what was wrong with Remus, but she thought that it had something to do with the sadness in his eyes.

"We knew he wasn't dying, not at that- basically, when he left the hospital he came with us, back to the Islington squat, and the doctors had told me that I could never play football again. At least not at a professional level."

"Oh, James," she sighed. She understood, now, why he would not want to see his mother. He wouldn't want her to know that he had failed.

"It's alright, it was two years ago. I'm over it. So. We didn't want to stay where we were, and we heard that things were happening in Camden, and Hestia knew Sirius of old, so we went there. And that's where we got our nicknames."

"I don't under-"

"Sybill- Sybs- she says she can read peoples _spirit animals_. A load of hippy bullshit, but we thought it was a laugh. And so we got them, our spirit animals, and that's what our nicknames are."

"I see," she replied with a smile. He smiled back, and continued. Their palms were growing sweaty, but they didn't let go.

"Hestia and Gideon moved here, and we moved with them. Sirius and Marlene, they went way back- she's been in these circles since she was a kid, but that's her story to tell- so we came here. And we've been here ever since."

She sat back for a moment, taking in all that he had said. Their hands were still clasped tightly, and without realizing it she began to stroke his knuckles with her thumb, going back and forth soothingly.

"And there was me," she said softly, "thinking you had an epiphany fifteen months ago, and decided to live the good life, like the sitcom. That you'd given up whatever you had for political reasons, or something. It never- I never thought, and I'm sorry, but I never thought that hadn't chosen this, you know? It's just…" she trailed off, because she could not think of the words to describe what she meant.

"Nah," he said, squeezing her hand, "nah, I get it."

They fell into silence, and the news droned on and on, and for a moment Lily completely forgot she was supposed to be angry with him, that her mother had slipped through her fingers like water because of him. She could only pity him, a little bit, because he'd followed his heart and got it broken. And she had too, she supposed. He was right; they were the same. Neither of them had wanted broken cupboards and dry cereals; she had been chasing adventure, the thrashing guitars of a teenage punk band, and all he had wanted to kick a ball around a field and bring joy to thousands of devoted fans, and they hadn't got that. All they'd got was the same boat. And it had been difficult to inhabit at first, but now they knew why they were there, and now, Lily thought, they might be able to start rowing.

* * *

She walked him back to the recording studio, hands in the pocket of Marlene's denim jacket, and they talked about nothing and everything. It seemed different now, the air that surrounded them, but they didn't mind.

"Why's Peter so obsessed with _Blue Peter_?" Lily wanted to know, and James laughed.

"Probably because they share a name," he told her, "he doesn't give much thought to what he likes and dislikes, he just…you know, he just _likes _stuff. Same as me, I suppose. But not Sirius, oh no, if you ask Sirius why he likes something he'll give you a bloody lecture, and by the end of it you'll like it too. He's got that way about him, I think. He's one of life's convincers."

"That's not a word," she chuckled, and he gasped with mock horror.

"I'm offended that you think I make words up, Miss Evans, and I'll have you know that I got perfect marks in English for four years straight thank you very much."

"Bet you got perfect marks in everything," she teased, linking arms with him.

"I did, yeah." he replied carelessly.

"Modest, aren't you?"

"Humble, too." was all he said, and she laughed louder.

They stopped outside a grey building with rusting gold letters above the door; _Podmore Records_ is what it read.

"This is me." James mumbled, suddenly nervous.

"That it is," she said briskly, "I'll see you at six, then?"

"What? Oh- yeah, yeah you will, yeah. See you at six. What're you doing for, y'know, dinner?"

"Hoping it exists." she sighed, shrugging her shoulders. He nodded slowly.

"Same."

"Well," Lily laughed, "I'm looking forward to hoping dinner exists together. If…urm…if that's-?"

"Yeah, hoping dinner exists together, yeah." he laughed a little louder than necessary, and she smiled up at him, for he was taller than she.

"Brilliant. See you then, um, then?"

"Yeah."

She giggled nervously, because she wasn't used to this, this new type of friendship where you'd seen inside the others soul. She'd never had it with Mary, or Sev, or even Petunia (_not really, it had always come at a price_). He had, though, she could tell, but never, it seemed with someone like her.

"I've got to…"

"Yeah…"

He doffed an imaginary cap in her direction, before turning abruptly and walking into the office. She swore she heard him whistling, and her cheeks ached from smiling.

* * *

It wasn't that _everything _had changed since she and James made up, but there was something decidedly different about the streets she walked down as she returned home. They weren't _prettier _per se, but they weren't as ugly as they had been before. She found herself humming as she went, a tuneless tune that sounded something like the _Blue Peter _theme song, and she smiled broadly at all who passed her.

On the street corner between where the High Street broke off into their road, there stood a gaggle of twenty-somethings, all clad in black. Lily's head started rushing, and the scar on her hairline seemed to ache with a sense of foreboding. They were waiting for her.

She suddenly understood the importance of numbers. When she was a kid, her mum had taken her to see the local Amateur Dramatics version of _The Boyfriend, _and they'd had a whole musical number dedicated to the fact that there is _safety in numbers_. When she was with Marlene, with Dorcas, with any of them, it was far less likely that it was _her _head getting kicked in. God that sounded selfish. But it was _true_.

"ALRIGHT, GINGE?" came a call from a skinny, snotty black haired boy who didn't look more than 14. She ignored them, pulling Marlene's jacket tighter around her body.

"OI!" the boy shouted again, "I'M TALKING TO YOU, PUNK SCUM!"

In order to get home, she knew she would have to go through them. _I can do it,_ she thought, _I can be like Dorcas, I can be made of steel_. But her breaths were uneven and her footsteps uneasy, and even the huge pockets of Marlene's jacket could not disguise her shaking hands.

"HE SAID," shrieked the dark haired woman- Bella, shrieked Bella, "ALRIGHT, GINGE?"

_In through the nose and out through the mouth, Lily, in through the nose and out through the mouth._

"Hello," she replied as politely as she possibly could as she approached them, "Please may I get through?"

Bella looked at the boy, and the boy looked at Bella's blonde sister, and all three began to laugh, cackling and screeching.

Lily tried to make her way through the crowd, but it was no use – as quickly as the hysterics had begun, they stopped, and Bella grabbed Lily's arm, fingernails digging into her pale flesh.

"Now look here, missy," she hissed, "You and me have got some unfinished business, haven't we?"

Lily said nothing, but tried to shake her way out of Bella's grasp. It did not work, and the older woman's nails cut into her skin.

"Your boyfriend's not here to save you now, is he, dear? No, it's just us, it's just us…"

She kept trying to get free, but she couldn't, she couldn't. Someone snatched her other arm, and she was being held there, on this street corner, by a gang of thugs. This wasn't an adventure, this was not what she had signed up for.

"I think it's time for me to finish what I started, don't you, darling?" Bella smiled maniacally, and Lily, frightened and alone, whimpered. She was not like Dorcas, she was not steel. She was not like Marlene, she was not ice. And she wasn't like Celia either, she wasn't sunshine, she wasn't anything. And it was with this thought that she fell to the ground, and curled up into a ball, and Bella and her cronies laid into her, their feet and hands thumping and smacking and tearing her apart.

_If this is how I am to die,_ she thought miserably, pulling her knees to her chest, _then let it be over quickly. Let me not realize that it has happened until it does_.

But of course, she did not die. If she had, then we would not have a story.

The thugs continued to kick her, and it got to a point where it was too exhausting to hold in her wails, and she began to sob loudly, tears stinging her grazed cheeks. They laughed cruelly, and eventually bony hands pulled her to her shaking feet.

"Did Miss McKinnon not teach you how to fight, child?" Bella teased, "Or are you just naturally a coward?"

Lily could see, just behind Bella's wild hair, the first house in their road. Home was moments away, just a few footsteps really, and if she could just get through the crowd…

"You are, aren't you?" Bella continued, "You are a coward…but you are also a child, aren't you sweetie?"

The way Lily saw it, she had two choices. One, she could sob loudly, and hope she attracted the bloke who ran the greasy spoon's attention. Or two, she could lunge forward, get home, run as fast as her weak legs would carry her. And they would laugh, and she might fall, once or twice, but she would get there, she would get home, and there she could make herself some tea, and she might have a biscuit, and oh, she could curl up on the sofa with a blanket and –

"Unluckily for you," Bella laughed, "I hate children."

And she shoved Lily hard, and the redhead fell to the ground with a thud. The force of the fall caused stars to pop in front of her eyes, and she tried desperately to pull herself up, back onto her feet, but they wouldn't let her. Bella's blonde sister held her down with her perfectly manicured hands, and Lily called out with pain as the boy who had shouted at her earlier rammed his boot into her side.

"GET OFF ME!" she shouted, "GET OFF ME! LEAVE ME ALONE! GET! OFF! ME!"

There was a scuffle, and a cry of rage from Bella, and Lily opened her eyes to see Celia's tiny hands grasping for hers, and Alex squaring up to the boy who had been kicking her.

"Let her go, Narcissa," Celia spat, "This isn't your fight. C'mon, Lily, c'mon, it's alright, I've got you."

Like a child, Lily took Celia's hands and allowed herself to be pulled up. Alex was shouting, but she couldn't hear what was being said, she could only hear blood rushing in her ears. Oh God, oh God, she was going to be sick.

Celia shoved her way through the scrum, and was followed by Alex, who ranted and raved as they walked, tiptoed, down the road. Her head thumped horribly, and she couldn't feel her left leg. She had blood all over Marlene's jacket, and the right side of her face was a mess, but she was alive. Thank God, she was alive.

* * *

"Now Lily," Celia handed her a mug of tea, "you don't have to tell us now…but if you could, at some point…it would be nice to know what happened so we can…" she trailed off, and Alex cut in.

"So we can ascertain the seriousness of the situation. What they did…it's pretty fucked up, y'know?"

She nodded slowly, and sipped her tea. She wasn't entirely sure how she'd ended up here, on the sofa, wrapped in Dorcas' blanket, with a plate of custard creams and a mug of tea. Her hands still had gravel on them, and her cheeks still ached, so they hadn't mopped her up.

"They just…they just _attacked _me," she began, and to her surprise, she began to cry, "I was trying to get through- and- and-"

"Shhhh, it's alright, kid," Celia soothed her, "it's alright, you don't have to say anything now. Just eat your biscuits and we'll talk later, yeah?" She reached out and smoothed Lily's hair. It occurred then, to our heroine that she knew very little about Celia and Alex. And they had been, were, so kind to her.

"I thought," she mumbled, drawing her knees up to her chin, "you were job hunting?"

They shared a concerned look, and then Alex said sadly; "Yeah, well…there was nothing going, so we came home."

"Where do you work- I'm not being nosey, or anything, I just-"

"Me and Alex are actors, Lily," Celia explained, plonking herself down on the sofa beside her, "or at least- we want to be. But for now, we're just taking what's being offered."

"Oh…"

"It's pretty hard to get cast in _Oliver _on the West End if you've got a whacking great still-not-fully-healed scar across the side of your face." she laughed sadly, and Lily suddenly fought the urge to hug her. Today, she had learnt that everyone has had, or still has, dreams. It had never occurred to her before. She had been selfish and arrogant enough to assume that she was the only one who ever wanted anything. But everyone did. She supposed that that was that made them human.

"Do you want a custard cream?" was all she said in reply.

* * *

When the Marauders returned later that night, Lily was asleep. Celia threw a blanket over her, and told everyone they weren't to go in the back room, for fear of disturbing their newest recruit.

"She's had a rough day," she told them in the kitchen, "You should've seen them, it was…it was horrible."

"I dread to think what would have happened if we hadn't turned up when we did…" Alex trailed off, and Dorcas patted his arm sympathetically.

There was silence, save for clinking of mugs against the table.

"Who was it?" Marlene asked thickly, like she was keeping her tears in her throat, "Was it the Lestranges?"

"I think…" Celia looked at Alex, who nodded with a sad smile, "I think it was the Black branch of the gang, if I'm honest."

All eyes turned to Sirius, whose jaw tightened. "I'll fucking kill him," he said.

"Don't," Remus replied, "don't do anything that'll get you into trouble, Sirius, we're in enough shit as it is."

"Moony's right, Padfoot," Peter added, "Regulus isn't-"

"Shut up, Wormtail," snapped Sirius, eyes fixed on the peeling linoleum, "just _shut up_." He downed his tea like a whiskey shot, and then said; "I'm going to the pub. Don't wait up for me."

He stalked out of the room, and everyone watched him go in silence. Except Marlene, who wiped her face with the back of her hand and snarled "Me too."

Nobody tried to stop them, and the wind howled through the thin windows.

"Is it bad enough to take her to a doctor?" James said eventually, voice low and quiet.

"No," Celia soothed him, "no, she'll be fine after a bath and a good night's-"

"Where's she supposed to have a fucking bath, Cee?" James spat, tears in his hazel eyes, "How's she supposed to relax around here? We've got no water, about two quid left in the heater- this isn't a home, it's a fucking mess."

Dorcas put her face in her hands with a stifled sob, and Celia crossed the room to James with such rage in her eyes she was frightening.

"Now look her, _bucko_," she growled, "I understand that you're upset, and that you are very, _very _fond of Lily, but acting like a twelve year old on her first period isn't going to solve _anything_. Are we clear?"

He blinked rapidly, and said nothing.

"James? I asked you, _are we clear_?"

"Crystal," he mumbled, "we're clear as crystal."

"Good," she replied, "now c'mere."

"What?"

"I'm going to hug you, you numpty."

And she wrapped her thin arms around him, and for a moment the rage that bubbled inside him stilled, as she whispered soothingly; "It'll be alright, kid, it'll be alright."

* * *

When Lily woke up, she was in her own bed. Wait- no she wasn't, because she slept on the floor, and she was on one of those shitty campbeds that her mum kept in the garage for whenever anyone came to stay. And she was in her pjamas. She hadn't been in her pjamas when she'd fallen asleep. Was she at home? She wasn't, she couldn't be, because at home, in her own room, the window was on the left, and here it was on the right. Where was-

"You're awake then?" came a voice from beside her. _James_. She turned to face him. He was sat on Marlene's bedside table, a mug of tea in his thin hands.

"'lo," she murmured. "Wait- _did you undress me_?"

He chuckled, and adjusted his glasses on his nose. "No, no, Dorcas sorted you out."

"This isn't where I sleep normally…" Lily said curiously, and James nodded, sipping his tea.

"We thought it was time for you to, y'know, get a proper bed. This has been knocking about in my room for ages, so I thought…"

With a quiet laugh, she lay back down on the pillow. "Finally got me into your bed, then?"

"Cheeky," he replied, and Lily closed her eyes.

"You'll be here when I wake up, won't you?" she whispered.

"'Course I will," his voice filled the darkness, "I'm not going anywhere."


End file.
